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Wednesday, February 23, 2011

Age-old grouse to be addressed, at last


by Aloke Tikku, Hindustan Times
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With the Cabinet Secretariat finally coming up with an objective formula to measure performance of file-pushing babus, civil servants in Delhi who get good grades would finally get monetary incentives from next year. The incentive, however, would not be directly linked to their individual grades but the performance of departments and divisions under their charge vis-à-vis their targets and success in cutting administrative costs.
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The total incentives to be disbursed amongst civil servants will not exceed 15% of the total savings in non-plan administrative expenditure. The annual targets that they would have to chase would have to be listed at the beginning of each financial year in consultation with an independent group of academics and retired bureaucrats.
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The consultation process would ensure that the targets set in the department’s Results Framework Document are not too easy.
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At the end of each year, achievement against the pre-determined targets would form the basis of the department’s score, according to the Performance Monitoring and Evaluation System for the central government, cleared by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh.
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Government officials contend that the system resolves the biggest hurdle in rewarding performing bureaucrats — measuring their performance.
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This system measures the performance of departments and thus, indirectly, the performance of the men and women who lead the departments.
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According to the plan drawn up by the cabinet secretariat, secretaries to the central government would be given financial incentives to be disbursed down the line. The incentive would be a function of the department’s score as well as the savings they make.
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It will be 20% for those who achieve all targets in the first three years, 30% between the fourth and sixth year and 40% from the seventh year onwards, till the ninth year.
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“The incentives increase because as the years go by, it will become more and more difficult to achieve ambitious targets and make savings. The system will force civil servants to be innovative in their approach,” a government official explained.
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But key ministries such as those dealing with defence, home and finance will be left out of the incentive scheme unless they voluntarily agree to have their performance evaluated.
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These are also departments — led by senior ministers — that have resisted suggestions to be covered under the performance evaluation scheme or haven’t volunteered.

3 comments:

  1. Dear Veterans,

    While our struggle goes on it seems the bureaucrats are profiting on the sly. Please see the mail sent by Col V Jagadesan from USA.

    Now they are to get incentive, without any accountability. Read the attachment also.

    Veteran Raman

    The attachment is just above for your information and Col Jagdeesans letter is below.

    ReplyDelete
  2. BABUS ARE GOING TO BE PAID INCENTIVE TO THE TUNE OF 60% of their basic

    My dear Col Raman

    I read a news stating that the BABUS ARE GOING TO BE PAID INCENTIVE TO THE TUNE OF 60% of their basic and this has come in to effect and barring few ministries the BABUS have given their acceptance and have started getting the increased pay which includes more DA and other perks.

    It means they have their own PAY COMMISSION and the rulers have granted the perks. This is India. Please check up with news and give wide publicity to this. Doing their normal work they are going to be given incentives means what a sham it is. This increase is based on their ACR and we all know how it is written in civil service. God save India. Here we cry for ONE RANK ONE PAY and they sitting in AC room are going to get the increase. yours sincerely

    Jagadesan V
    venkataraman jagadesan
    jagadesanv@yahoo.com

    ReplyDelete
  3. I wish to add a very interesting piece of information to what Col V Jagadesan and Col Raman have contributed.

    Some of my close relatives (My own brother, niece etc) are working for LIC. The other day, they told me that LIC is paying incentive to its officers and staff, just for reporting to office in time ; Mind you - not for the work output or efficiency or business turn over - but simply for stepping inside the office in time !!

    The payment is at a whooping rate of Rs 70 to Rs 150 ( or so ) per day. My niece gets an additional Rs 2,500 - Rs 3,000 per month, jolly good money for fun and entertainment ! They are paid in coupons, usable in prominent sales outlets like Big Bazaar.

    Can we pause for a moment and recollect the number of times we had punished our men for being late on parade or duty ?

    This is India to-day.

    NBS.
    Brig Subramanian
    brigbalan@foghorninc.com

    ReplyDelete