Has the government decision to have separate cadre for Education Administrative Services hit a roadblock?

The J&K government in June last year took a landmark decision to have a separate cadre of Education Administrative Services (EAS) in the school education department for J&K.

The initiative was taken after the former J&K Lieutenant Governor (LG) G C Murmu while chairing a review meeting asked the department to formulate a concept note for establishing separate administrative cadre for the department to have a separate academic and administrative expertise.

   

Within no time, the initiative took a formal shape after a 6-member committee headed by Director School Education Kashmir (DSEK) was constituted and entrusted to submit its report within two weeks to the administrative department.

But around 10 months have passed since then but the government seems to have shelved the decision to have a separate education administrative cadre in the department. The decision seems to have hit a roadblock at the administrative level as the decision has not seen any progress in this regard for the last 10 months.

The decision if implemented in letter and spirit is expected to remove stagnation of the officers which have been deprived of their promotion for a long time in the department.

As per the existing rules of the department, the post of the Director or Joint Director has to be filled in by the person within the department. But the government deputes any KAS or IAS officers to fill the posts which deprive the employees of the department for their elevation to the level of joint director and director of the department.

Once the EAS cadre becomes effective in the department, the officials within the department will be adjusted at any administrative posts after proper screening by the Public Service Commission (PSC) or any other mechanism.

As per the existing system, the school education department gets employees on deputation from other departments to fill the vacancies in accounts and planning wing. The officers from district to division level are deputed from other departments.

But the introduction of SEA cadre will enable the department to fill all these posts from within the department.

The six member departmental committee was supposed to submit its recommendations to the department in two weeks but the inordinate delay in executing the things speaks volumes about the seriousness of the government to make this fruitful initiative a reality in the department.

The six member committee which was constituted in June last year convened few meetings to deliberate on the issue but there was no headway in this decision beyond the meetings. The much needed initiative seems to have been shelved by the government for unknown reasons.

Over the years it has been that any reformative decision taken by the officer or officers at the helm of affairs takes a back seat after the incumbent officer gets shifted to another department. With this practice, almost every decision aimed at bringing reforms in the department was silently shelved.

For instance, the school education department had decided to post only promising human resources in the district Institutes of Education and Training (DIETs) and erstwhile State Institute of Education (SIE) now SCERT.

The decision was taken amid outcry over the selective postings of some masters and lecturers by the department in these premier institutes for prolonged periods in violation of norms. The department worked out modalities and started to go ahead with the process. But a few months later, the incumbent officers at the helm of affairs were shifted and the initiative took a back seat. Like this, scores of other decisions also witnessed the same fate depriving the department to see any reforms in the academics as well as at the administrative level. Any reformative decision taken by the incumbent officers are treated as personal decisions rather than a policy decision and are shelved for unknown reasons.

With this the influential teachers, masters and lecturers continue to enjoy their prolonged stint in these premier institutes in complete violation of transfer policy of the department. The teaching staff in these institutes rarely gets posted in schools to teach the students. This is the outcome of government laxity to delay the implementation of all the reformative decisions which are aimed for betterment of the department.

But the decision to have a SEA cadre was not a personal decision of the officers at the helm of affairs but the proposal was being worked out in line with the New Education Policy (NEP) drafted by the Ministry of Human Resource Development (MHRD), Government of India.

It is worthwhile to mention that the NEP has mentioned about three service cadres which include education administrative service, education academic service and teacher education service.

Once the department will have all the three separate cadres, the teacher education will be a separate cadre which will be directly recruited and will undertake only training of teachers. Also, this cadre will not be inter transferable but will have their separate cadre. Under this category there will be separate cadre for people in SCERT, DIETs, District Resource Persons (DRPs) and Cluster Resource Persons (CRPs) as well.

Also, EAS cadre will simply run the establishment and deal with the human resource management in the department while the education academic service will focus on overall academic activities in the department.

Given the significance of the decision, the government should have prioritized to work out the modalities and get it implemented in the school education department.

Given the present circumstances wherein the department is overburdened with academics as well as with administrative works, the government should work on having SEA for the betterment of the department. It will not only remove the stagnation of officers but will also encourage them to work with utmost dedication during their tenure in the department.

The government should seek the report from the committee and expedite the process to have SEA cadre in the department. Let there be some positivity in the department.

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