Finance Minister Arun
Jaitley seems to be holding a view that minimum human resources means maximum
governance.
At least the Budget
speech he delivered on February 29 could create such an impression as he
talked, in the same breath, about IT-enabled process reforms and the need for
human resource rationalisation.
The "governance
and ease of doing business" section of the Budget speech talks about NDA
government's "unparalleled" emphasis to good governance with
special focus on process reforms, IT-enabled government processes, etc. Stating
that the whole idea is to remove the irritants for the public in
their interface with government agencies, Jaitley explains that a task force has
been constituted for rationalisation of human resources in various
ministries. A comprehensive review and rationalisation of autonomous
bodies is underway, he informs.
The message seems to
be favouring automation and less job openings in the Central government services
in future. While one can only appreciate the government's intention to provide
quicker, transparent and efficient services to its citizens, reduction of human
resources need not always achieve that goal. In some cases,
even replenishment of human resources could be the need of the
hour.
HERE IS WHY
The Central government
is already functioning with less number of employees than what is supposed to
be its sanctioned strength.
Of the total
sanctioned posts of 37.16 lakh in various Central government services, over six
lakh remain vacant today. A huge majority, 5.3 lakh vacancies, are at the
clerical and support staff level. There are over 50,000 vacancies among Group B
level positions and close to 18,000 at the Group-A officers' level. A year ago,
4,802 IAS officers were in position against a total sanctioned strength of
6,375.
The Seventh Central
Pay Commission, in its report in November 2015, informs that the current sanctioned
strength of the Central government is approximately the same as it used to be
10 years ago (37 lakh in 2006). In other words, rationalisation of
human resources has been an on-going process because of which the total
sanctioned strength of 38.9 lakh in 2014 has come down to 37.16 lakh. The
effective employee strength, if one takes out the vacant posts, would be 31
lakh, a figure that is closer to 29.82 lakh of sanctioned strength forty five
years ago (in 1971).
The total number of
sanctioned posts was perhaps the highest in 1994 (41.76 lakh) as India's
economic liberalisaiton during that period saw disinvestments in sectors like
telecom and resultant reduction in government jobs in the following
years.
There are more reasons
to believe that we may not be able to do away with too many posts immediately.
In a submission before the Pay Commission, the Joint Consultative Machinery
(JCM)-Staff Side had pointed out that contrary to the common perception, 88 per
cent of Central government employees are either industrial or operational staff
or not administrative staff. It also points to the increasing trend of outsourcing
human resources through contracts, another reason, perhaps, for
less-optimal performance.
Finally,
this is not the first time BJP government is attempting
to downsize the number of Central government employees. The first NDA
government under A.B. Vajpayee had brought in a plan to optimise (not
rationalise) the recruitment to Central government jobs in 2001. The government
wanted to bring in 10 per cent reduction in total sanctioned strength in a
phased manner over a period of time. As per the "Optimisation
Scheme", all ministries and departments were mandated to prepare the
Annual Direct Recruitment Plan for each year in order to prioritise the fresh
intake of manpower. It continued for five years, and was extended for three
more years, even after the change of regime at the Centre.
It was the Sixth
Central Pay Commission which recommended the scrapping of the scheme as it felt
that while "multiskilling of the government employees would increase
their operational efficiency while simultaneously optimizing the
staff strength", a blanket ban on filling up of vacant posts across the
board can impact effective functioning of the government.
While appreciating the
government's intend to right size its human resources given the changes in the
work process due to technology and consequent reduction of layers, the
Commission suggested more flexibility for effective service delivery.
"Care has to be taken that administrative delivery structures do not
become hollow or thin in critical areas", it had stated.
By explicitly
announcing the government's decision to revise the pay structure of the Central
government employees on the basis of the Seventh Pay Commission recommendation,
Jaitley has committed to spend more on salaries. However, it should not result
in the finance minister ignoring the warning given by the Sixth Pay
Commission.
Rationalisation of
human resources is good, if it is purely to improve governance and efficiency.
Cutting jobs with the sole objective of reducing the salary burden may not be advisable.
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