After terminating over 400 private persons appointed by the Arvind Kejriwal government as advisors, consultants, fellows, advisors in different departments, autonomous bodies and Public Sector Undertakings, the Delhi government’s Services Department on Wednesday directed all departments to stop engagements of all the fellows/ Associate Fellows/ Advisors/ Dy. Advisors/ Specialists/ Senior Research Officers/ Consultants, by whatever name, without the approval of Lieutenant Governor of Delhi. Further, the Service Department has urged the Finance Department to direct all the Pay and Account Offices not to release salary to them with the consent of LG.
Lieutenant Governor Vinai Kumar Saxena has directed to immediately terminate services of around 437 private persons appointed by the city government as advisors, consultants, fellows, advisors in different departments, autonomous bodies and PSUs. According to a statement shared by the L-G House, Saxena’s directions came following a proposal made by the Services Department.
“If any administrative department finds it appropriate to continue such engagements, the detailed case with all records and proper justification shall be forwarded by the concerned Departments to the Services Department, Delhi government for onward submission to Lt. Governor for consideration and approval immediately. All the departments are accordingly directed to comply with the above instructions failing which action, as may deem fit, may be initiated against the concerned Administrative Secretary for violation of the Constitutional Provisions on Reservation,” Special Secretary ( Services Department) YVVJ Rajasekhar said in a letter to all Administrative Secretaries and Head of Departments of Delhi government.
The Services Department has said that there were a total of 437 fellows, associate fellows, advisors, deputy advisors, specialists/senior research officers and consultants were appointed in as many as 18 departments, autonomous bodies, PSUs, Corporations, Boards, etc where approvals of Lieutenant Governor were not taken. These engaged persons were taking salaries between Rs 25,000 and Rs 1.5 lakh per month depending of their designations.
As per details, the Assembly has engaged 140 fellow and associate fellow with monthly salary ranged from Rs 60,000 to Rs one lakh. The Department of Archeology has hired 12 persons and out of which 6 were Senior Research Fellow and 6 were Junior Research Fellow. The environment department has engaged 28 private persons including three specialists, 10 fellows and 15 associate fellows were engaged while 15 SRF and 5 JRF were engaged in Department of Delhi Achieves. As many as five persons were employed in the Department of Women and Child Development and 7 persons in the Department of Industries. A whopping 49 persons were engaged on various positions in the DTC, 43 persons in the SCERT, 6 persons in the DUSIB, three in the DDRS, 13 persons in the DTIDC, four persons in the DPCC, 9 persons including media advisor, chief media advisor, visiting consultant, nodal officer, etc in the Delhi Jal Board, one person each in the Delhi Parks and Garden Society, Delhi Tourism, , Delhi State Institute of Cancer and Delhi Agriculture Marketing Board.
According to officials, the appointments of these personnel were made by flouting the constitutional provisions of reservation; by depriving the people belonging to Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes and OBCs from their constitutional rights and through back door entry without meeting the qualification / experience.