9 IAS officers already with GoI, 6 more seek deputation

*No takers for post of IIT Jammu Director
Sanjeev Pargal

JAMMU, Jan 22: With six senior Indian Administrative Services (IAS) officers of Jammu and Kashmir cadre seeking Central deputation, the State Government has taken up the issue with the Government of India not to clear the deputations till approved by Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti as the State was already facing shortage of the senior officers.
Official sources told the Excelsior that the Government took up the matter with top hierarchy in the Central Government calling upon them not to sanction deputations of senior IAS officers to the Centre or other States until they are duly approved by the Chief Minister herself as she holds the charge of the General Administration Department (GAD).
The Government step was necessitated as nearly half a dozen senior IAS officers had applied for deputation to Centre and some other States with the Government of India. In turn, the IAS officers of Jammu and Kashmir, who were already on deputation with the Centre were reluctant to return on one pretext or the other and were getting their deputations extended.
“The deputation of more IAS officers, presently working in the State, to the Centre or other States would have lead to more shortage of officers in senior category,” sources pointed out and said it was in this context that the State Government has taken up the matter with the Centre and asked them not to clear more deputations of the State officers unless the officers on Central deputation returned.
The State Government is understood to have insisted that the IAS officers from Jammu and Kashmir shouldn’t be moved out-either for Central deputation or for other States even if they insisted unless the State Government duly cleared their deputation. Instead, they said, the Government has asked for return of some of the senior IAS officers of Jammu and Kashmir cadre from the Centre.
However, according to sources, majority of senior officers from Jammu and Kashmir cadre and presently on deputation with the Centre and some other States have expressed their reluctance to return to the State, at least for the time being. Even those, who have completed their period of Central deputation, were trying to get their deputation extended further.
Pointing out that top functionaries of the Government of India have personally taken up the issue with Jammu and Kashmir cadre IAS officers, posted in New Delhi, calling upon them to return but they were hesitant.
Sources said some of the senior IAS officers have voiced their reservations over the style of functioning of some of the BJP Ministers in Jammu and Kashmir. They have conveyed their issues to the Central Government functionaries too.
Nine IAS officers of Jammu and Kashmir cadre are presently on deputation with the Centre or some other States.
They included KB Aggarwal, Additional Secretary in Union Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, Suresh Kumar, Additional Secretary, Union Ministry of Coal, Sudhanshu Panday, Joint Secretary, Department of Commerce, Arun Kumar Mehta, Joint Secretary, Union Ministry of Environment and Forests and Climate Change, Atal Dulloo, Joint Secretary in the Department of Rural Development, Umang Narula, Chairman and Managing Director, Indian Tourism Development Corporation, MK Dwivedi, Joint Secretary in Union Ministry of Commerce, Mandeep Kour, Department of Revenue, Government of India and Pandurang Kondbarao Pole, who is on inter-cadre deputation to Maharashtra.
Four senior IAS officers and two new comers, posted in Jammu and Kashmir, have applied for Central deputation.
“Not only the IAS officers, Jammu’s newly created Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) has also failed to find any Director,” sources said.
The Union Ministry for Human Resources Development had invited applications for the posts of IIT Directors countrywide. The HRD Ministry didn’t receive even a single application for the post of Director for the IIT Jammu. Later, the HRD Ministry persuaded one of the senior researcher for the job but he opted out before his appointment order could be issued citing that he was more interested in research than the job of Director IIT Jammu.
According to sources, militancy and unrest were some of the factors for the HRD Ministry not finding any suitable candidate for the post of Director IIT Jammu.
Sources wondered that in such a situation it would be difficult for the State to find top functionaries including Directors and senior faculty for two All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS), which have been approved by the Government of India for Jammu and Srinagar.

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