Govt. takes serious view of uncertainty on number of employees in departments and allied institutions

The State government has taken a serious view of the uncertainty over the exact number of employees working on regular as well as temporary basis in different departments, undertakings and allied institutions.

In a memorandum circulated to the departments, the Finance department has set October 25 as the deadline for uploading cadre strength in each department, including the number of employees on contract outsourcing and other bases. The departments concerned will not be permitted to take up the process of claiming salary/remuneration for this month in case of failure to upload the information on the Integrated Financial Management and Information System (IFMIS) portal.

The development follows allegations that the previous BRS government resorted to irregularities in terms of number of contract and outsourcing employees working in different departments and agencies. It was alleged that huge amounts were diverted from the State exchequer in the name of payment of salaries/wages to temporary staff. Accordingly, steps have been initiated to identify the actual number of employees working in different departments so that an assessment could be made about the quantum of salaries that is being paid to them every month.

Senior officials said there are over 10 lakh employees on regular and temporary basis working in different departments after the Congress government took over the reins as compared with the 9.16 lakh, including 2.9 lakh regular employees and 2.8 lakh pensioners (service and family pensioners), as ascertained by the Planning department at the end of the financial year 2020-21. The temporary staff are working on contract/ outsourcing/ honorarium/ activity outsourcing/ MTS/daily wage/ part time/ full time/ guest/ hourly based services in the departments/ heads of departments/ institutions/ corporations/ societies/ local bodies/ universities and others. The departments were asked to mandatorily upload the Aadhaar card details, cell number and other details of staff on regular and temporary basis.

Instructions were issued for updating the details of the employees by the 10^th of every month. “Many departments are due for uploading their data in the IFMIS portal,” the circular said.

According to officials, data pertaining to 2.22 lakh out of the 5.21 lakh regular employees and 2.74 lakh of the 4.93 lakh temporary staff has been uploaded living a huge balance of around five lakh employees.