The Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) is unhappy with the Delhi Government for granting time-bound pay scales to DANICS officers who have completed 13, 18 and 21 years of service despite the MHA being the cadre controlling authority. Also, the decision of the Delhi Government has created a rift between the IAS and DANICS.
The Kejriwal Government’s move in favour of the DANICS officers is being viewed in the political circle as the Government’s attempt to appease this set of bureaucrats as the IAS lobby had not been cooperating with it in its day-to-day functioning. DANICS officials are eying plum postings at the cost of IAS officers, who feel are on the wrong side of the Arvind Kejriwal Government, according to sources.
The ongoing battle has seen a vertical split between IAS and DANICS officers.
Well placed sources told The Pioneer that the Delhi Government’s decision to grant time bound pay scales is legally void as they are not the cadre controlling authority for DANICS cadre. “The MHA is the cadre controlling authority of IAS and DANICS. Any enhancement of salary is the part of service condition of All India Services rules. Any change in service conditions can be modified only by the cadre controlling authority, that is MHA,” said the sources.
Interestingly, the Home Ministry had earlier endorsed the time bound pay scale policy for DANICS a few years ago but the same could not be implemented. One of the issues being debated in the MHA is that till the time DANICS officers serve in the Delhi Government, they can enjoy the benefits of revised pay scales approved by the Delhi Cabinet. But they will lose the revised pay scale when transfer Andaman, Goa, Arunachal Pradesh, Daman, Nicobar and Diu.
Observers feel that the AAP Government has successfully created a division among bureaucracy in Delhi. The Government doesn’t like IAS as they follow transaction of business rules while DANICS are closed to this Government as they have got opportunities to get plump posts which are fixed for only IAS officers, said sources.
Besides, there have been several instances in the past when senior IAS officers had refused to toe the Government line in deciding critical policy matters. While the Government wanted these IAS officers to overrule Raj Niwas in decision making, the officers refused to do so by strictly following the Transaction of Business Rules.
On many occasions, the AAP Government had even issued show-cause notices to its top bureaucrats, including chief secretary K K Sharma, for not following in line with the AAP agenda. The Government’s move had reportedly demoralised the top bureaucracy, who in principle, had decided to follow only TBR in decision making.