Department of Personnel and Training (DoPT)’s decision to curtail the inter-state deputation of 1998 batch IAS officer and former personal secretary to CM Mohammad Shahid in the wake of raging liquor scam has left the bureaucrats scared. Now, they are watching every unfolding episode with keen and panic-ridden interests. Sources said that Md Shahid has been relieved by the state government but officially no confirmation has been made so far. The bureaucrats who do errands at the behest of their political masters willy-nilly have sounded panicky with swords of such stern action seemingly dangling over their heads too. Some sounded relieved too, saying that the era of bureaucrats dancing to the strings held by their political bosses is ending.
Talking to The Pioneer, an officer mentioned the first paragraph of the DoPT letter, saying that such a drastic step of asking Md Shahid to report to his immediate previous place of posting prior to the inter cadre deputation to Uttarakhand holds terror for all of them.
“The opening line makes it clear that the DoPT had taken the decision on its own as the letter made no reference to any file sent from the end of the state government for the cancellation of the deputation. It is logical that if things were otherwise the letter would have referred to such proposal. Here, the reference notes were dated July 24. The order was passed on July 25 (Saturday) when DoPT usually remained closed, something that makes clear the seriousness with which the Centre is dealing with it ,” the officer added.
On Monday, most of the bureaucrats looked rattled. They said they are worried about their future with the political leaders meddling into their day- to- day functioning and forcing them to follow things as dictated. A few of them said the quality of governance would suffer a lot if the shaky officers approve files submitted by their subordinates without scrutinizing the contents. “Who would take risks with DoPT monitoring things closelyIJ We would naturally pass the buck to the seniors,” said another visibly nervous IAS.