Srinagar: The present dispensation has been on the receiving end for most of the time as its opponents have leveled serious charges on the governance front besides the failure of the government t to tackle nepotism and corruption.

The charge of being soft towards some blue eyed boys has not been unfounded. The government not only raised several questions itself by appointing some consultants in various government departments but some cases of backdoor appointments have also come to the fore.

Recently when the assembly was in session several members raised questions over the fraudulent appointments that have been made in various corporations including SIDCO and SICOP.

 The Minister in charge of Industries and Commerce while replying to these allegations admitted about the recruitment of more than a hundred persons in these two prestigious public undertakings.

The Minister said that more than a 100 persons were  recruited in the two PSUs mentioned above without making them go through the proper course of submission of application, scrutiny, short listing, interview/written examination and proper verification of their documents etc. The inference, obviously, is that no transparency has been observed deliberately and rules and regulations have been thrown to wind.

The question of making back door recruitments is widely debated and condemned in political, legislative and other circles. Though the two autonomous bodies in question are running and operating independently but still the government exercises its control by appointing top bosses from the bureaucracy and controlling the finances and other matters as well.

The two undertakings have disregarded the established norms of recruitment in different cadres. The service rules apply to them as to other government employees in regard to recruitment which means a proper selection technically called going through the mill.

The members in the Legislative Assembly who criticized the methodology of backdoor entry of fresh recruits are very right and they have raised pertinent issue which the Minister and the government must answer properly and rectify if irregularities have been made.

The government cannot escape the questioning made on the basis of favoritism or corruption as it has over the past few months learned to adopt a criminal silence over the issue of backdoor appointments.

Even few months back when some consultants were hired for various government departments, many questions were raised but the government remained unmoved. Even the corruption watchdog, Vigilance organization has prescribed a set of guidelines for the government for making appointments of consultants but these were not followed. 

The vigilance has in a report submitted to the government said that some organizations appoint consultant due to lack of in-house expertise in technical matters. While hiring consultants is justified for such organizations, of late, it has been observed that even the engineering departments and some PSUs, with large technical set-up have indulged in the practice of hiring consultants.

It has invariably been noticed that the appointment of consultants is done in an adhoc and non-transparent manner without inviting tenders and without collecting adequate data about their performance, capability and experience.

Guest