LAHORE: The chief minister has restored promotions of provincial service officers in BPS-18 to 21 on officiating basis against deputation, training, leave (DTL) vacancies, granting a facility that was disallowed several years ago.

According to officials on Sunday, promotions of provincial officials on officiating (temporary) basis against posts falling vacant after regular officials proceeded on deputation, leave or for training was allowed in Rule 13 of the Punjab Civil Servants (Appointment and Conditions of Service Rules) 1974.

Previously, the government would allow such promotions against 40 per cent of total posts in a cadre. But this practice was stopped after an opinion by the regulation department that this quota could not be fixed.

“The restoration of the facility though in lesser terms will open the promotion doors for PMS officers besides helping the government overcome severe shortage of staff at the senior level,” an official said.

According to officials, it was very important for the government to fill in all sanctioned posts for smooth running of its business. But the situation in the services and general administration department (S&GAD) regarding its cadre posts was bright, as a large number of its BPS-18 to 21 posts were lying vacant as a large number of its officers posted on deputation in various government-controlled autonomous bodies, corporations and projects are either on leave or on training. Resultantly, the cadre posts remain vacant, hampering the government’s performance.

Presently, there is a severe shortage of officers in various administrative departments as well as district and divisional field formations. Officers in several departments, attached departments, field formations and autonomous bodies are holding additional charge of more than one post.

The officials said the process of restoring the promotion on officiating basis started after PMS officers association members called on the chief secretary late last year and highlighted the issue. They demanded creation/restoration of DTL reserve posts in BPS-18 and above. The chief secretary constituted a committee to calculate the actual number of officers on DTL.

After a series of meetings, the committee held its final meeting in September 2018 and it was informed that the number of officials on DTL was very high: 25 per cent officers in BPS-18, 21pc in BPS-19, 10pc in BPS-20 and 4pc in BPS-21 were on DTL.

Keeping in view the reservations of the finance secretary owing to the financial implications that the creation of these posts would entail, it was decided that the percentage of posts to be created would be curtailed. Accordingly, the committee recommended that for the time being, the following posts may be created to meet the chronic shortage of officers on the strength of S&GAD -- BPS-18 (93), BPS-19 (50), BPS-20 (13) and BPS-21 (two). The total number of posts in these grades is 465, 247, 133 and 33, respectively.

The officials said that the chief minister has approved this recommendation and a notification would soon be issued after a formal approval by the standing committee of the cabinet on finance and development.

Published in Dawn, January 28th, 2019