With Bibek Debroy panel on restricting railways suggesting rationalizing the number of employees working in the state transporter as it is the single most significant expenditure item, Railways has now shortlisted four human resource audit companies to do the task.
Four companies shortlisted for this purpose are Earnst and Young, Deloitte, Price cooper waterhouse and KPMG, said Railway Board Member (Staff) Pradeep Kumar.
One of these companies will be entrusted with the job of studying the entire gazetted staff and non-gazetted strength which is around 13.36 lakh. These companies will examine the Railways' manpower given the technological development and changes in operational and maintenance practices and determine the optimal level of the staff strength in the coming years.
"We will also hire a reputed consultant to examine the strength in non-gazetted section to study the system and requirement and see if there is any extra flab," he said, adding that railways will also take into account the international benchmarks before deciding on the issue.
Debroy panel, which submitted its final report last week, found that large number of Group D employees still continue to carry out jobs and responsibilities that are now quite obsolete, for instance Bhisty, Mochi, Sarang, dhobi etc and the provision of telephone attendant cum dak khalasi (TADK) needs to be reviewed dispassionately for its discontinuation.
Kumar, however,s aid that these will continue to work in railways when asked if railways would retain Group D workers as domestic staff at officers' bungalows. “There is a need for it as railways functions round-the- clock," he said.
To ensure transparency in appointment in railways, it has been decided to conduct all examinations online as a fool-proof measures against malpractices.
He said as a major IT initiative, online applications were introduced in two recent exams to fill 6000 posts of Senior Section Engineers and Junior Engineers (SSEs/JEs) and Para-Medical categories respectively to bring transparency and certainty into recruitment process.
As per the new system, the Railway Recruitment Board (RRB) candidates can keep the question booklets. A pilot project of uploading of answer keys and cut-off marks was initiated in 2014-15. In the railway recruitment drive during 2014-15, examinations were conducted for 48,822 vacancies in 284 categories.
