The first ‘full house’ meeting of the Punjab Cabinet, after its expansion in April, took a slew of important decisions on Tuesday including approving jobs for the kin of Mosul tragedy on compassionate grounds, reducing pass percentage for vesting certain powers in SDMs, approving one-time relaxation in rules to fill 282 vacant posts of staff nurses, among others.
Even as the Cabinet was expected to decide upon the state’s new mining policy after the cabinet sub-committee had presented its report to the Chief Minister Capt Amarinder Singh a day before, the same is said to be deferred for the next meeting.
The meeting started with the Chief Minister welcoming the newly appointed ministers, while informing that Aruna Chaudhary could not be present as she was out of town.
In a major decision, the Cabinet has given its approval to provide financial assistance and grant employment, on compassionate grounds, to the next of kin of the persons killed in Mosul (Iraq) — even as the state maintained that it “does not fall within the purview of the state policy”.
“The state government has decided to provide employment to one dependent family member of the victims, as per their educational qualification and government's policy, besides ex-gratia amount of Rs five lakh. It was also decided to continue with the monthly pension of Rs 20,000 being paid to the family members from the Chief Minister’s Relief Fund till the time the jobs are provided,” said the government spokesperson.
Rs five lakh ex-gratia each has already been disbursed from the CM’s Relief Fund to 26 dependent family members amounting to Rs 1.30 crore, said an official spokesperson, adding that, as per records, one victim had no legal heir.
Pertinently, the case of providing compassionate appointment to dependent family members of the 27 deceased Indians from Punjab does not fall within the purview of the state policy.
“Relaxation in the policy was required for this purpose. Keeping in view the hardships faced by the victims’ families, the Cabinet decided to relax the existing policy of the state government as notified on November 21, 2002. However, the remaining conditions of the policy would remain applicable,” said the spokesperson.
Notably, in a tragic incident, 39 Indians were kidnapped and killed by ISIS in Mosul (Iraq) in 2014. The bodies of deceased were exhumed and DNA tests were conducted, following which the mortal remains of 27 deceased Indians from Punjab were brought back to Amritsar on April 3, 2018. The deceased hailed from eight districts, namely Amritsar, Hoshiarpur, Jalandhar, ludhiana, Shaheed Bhagat Singh Nagar, Sangrur, Kapurthala and Gurdaspur.
AMENDMENT OKAYED TO REDUCE PASS PERCENTAGE FOR VESTING CERTAIN POWERS IN SDMs
The pass percentage from 66.66 percent to 50 percent in ‘Criminal law’ and ‘Revenue law’ papers have been reduced for vesting powers of Executive Magistrate and Assistant Collector or Collector to IAS or PCS (executive branch) officers.
The same was done by approving an amendment in Rule-12 of the Civil Services (Departmental Examination) Punjab Rules-2014 for the posts of Assistant Commissioner or Extra Assistant Commissioner. Since Rule-10 is not being amended, officers still need to pass in higher standard, that is 66.66 percent in order to clear their probation or promotion.
Besides, to rationalize the existing Rules, some minor changes are also proposed to be made in Rules 4(3), 4(6), 10(1) pertaining to exemption and language etc.
The changes have been approved in view of the fact that a large number of officers do not score the prescribed 66.66 percent marks in ‘Criminal law’ and ‘Revenue law’ papers in the first or second attempt.
“When such officers are posted as Sub-Divisional Magistrate etc, they cannot be vested with powers of Executive Magistrate or Assistant Collector Grade-I or Collector. Consequently, they are not able to perform their duties effectively,” said the spokesperson.
282 VACANT POSTS OF STAFF NURSES TO BE FIllED
Facing acute shortage of staff nurses in Government Medical Colleges and Hospitals across the state, the Cabinet had decided to fill staff nurses’ posts on contract basis in Medical Education and Research Department through relaxation in the instructions issued by the Personnel Department on April 24, 2017, as per which a complete ban had been imposed on future contractual appointments against regular posts. The move is aimed at upgrading healthcare facilities for general public and, at the same time, save the Government Medical Colleges from the threat of disaffiliation from Medical Council of India due to shortage of staff.
QUARKCITY REVISED AGREEMENT EXTENDED
To create state-of-the-art industrial and urban infrastructure in the state in two phases, Cabinet also approved to extend the revised agreement with Quarkcity India Private limited from November 3, 2023, to November 2, 2030, in line with the original agreement that was signed in 2003.
BPSSBY EXTENDED TIll OCT 31
Cabinet also gave ex-post facto approval to extend Bhagat Puran Singh Sehat Bima Yojana (BPSSBY) — providing upto Rs five lakh cashless health insurance cover to blue card holder families, J-form holder farmers, small traders and construction workers — till October 31, 2018, by aligning with the Centre’s National Health Protection Scheme (NHPS) for the poor and vulnerable families listed in Socio Economic Caste Census (SECC) 2011. With this, 14.96 lakh SECC families would be covered.