Bhubaneswar: The General Administration (GA) department Wednesday announced integration of the directorates with their respective administrative departments in an apparent move to give impetus to decision-making.
In an array of modalities, the notification by the department explained how the order will be executed. The formalities and rejig is expected to create a major reshuffle of government officials working under various departments.
However, the government claimed that the ranks and other benefits would not be compromised with during the reshuffle of offices.
In the notification, the department, while talking about the reshuffle, stated, “In order to streamline the functioning of directorates and speed up the process of decision-making, the government is pleased to integrate the different directorates with their respective administrative departments to function as composite departments with immediate effect.”
To expedite the process of decision-making the GA department notification claims that there will be a single file system through OSWAS and every proposal deferred by the Directorate should not be re-initiated or re-examined in the department. Meanwhile, the sections like Office Establishment, Issue and Accounts, Cash among others common to both the offices will be clubbed into one and re-organised.
The department, however, tried to allay the staff fears of any threat to their ranks and cadres. The notification said, “The concerned staff will continue to remain in their respective cadres and will avail service benefits in their own cadre hierarchy. On account of promotion, death, resignation or otherwise, the base level posts in the Heads of Department will stand abolished.”
The order claims that the vacancy should now be filled up from Secretariat Common Cadre meant for Heads of Department. However, such recruitments are likely to be filled while keeping in mind the administrative necessity and discussions with the Finance Department. On the other side, the recruitment at the level of Junior Assistant in the Heads of Department cadre has been halted until further order.
The move is expected to cope with the staff crunch in different departments by pooling of staff together. It has been planned that as per the notification that surplus staff should be surrendered to the pool being managed by the Administrative Reforms Cell of the GAD for re-deployment. On the other hand, vacant posts at lowest levels have been planned to be abolished.
