Follow convention in filling up posts in Chandigarh Administration, Punjab CM urges Governor

CHANDIGARH: Punjab Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann has urged Governor Banwarilal Purohit to follow the convention and maintain the 60:40 ratio between Punjab and Haryana while filling up posts in the Chandigarh administration.

According to a statement, Mann, in a letter to the Governor said officers from the AGMUT cadre are being posted on the most important posts, which were earlier held by IAS officers from the Punjab cadre.

Mann urged the Governor to personally look into the matter so that the IAS officers from Punjab cadre on deputation with the Chandigarh administration are assigned departments as per the "well laid out convention and without any discrimination".

The AGMUT cadre IAS officers serve in Arunachal Pradesh, Goa, Mizoram and union territories.

The Punjab Governor is also the administrator of Chandigarh.

The statement has come at a time when Mann is being accused of surrendering Punjab's claim over Chandigarh, which is a union territory and serves as the joint capital of both states.

In his letter to the Governor, Mann said following the reorganisation of Punjab in 1966, officers are generally taken on inter-cadre deputation with the approval of the Centre against some posts such as home secretary, finance secretary, deputy commissioner and the municipal commissioner.

In the past, posts of the finance secretary and the municipal commissioner were filled by IAS officers from the Punjab cadre while those of the home secretary and the deputy commissioner held by IAS Officers from the Haryana cadre, he said.

Mann said these officers are chosen after a rigorous selection process and they are given charges of various key departments as well.

Over the past a few years, it has been noticed that the strength of IAS officers from the AGMUT cadre has been consistently increasing in the administration and they hold most important posts, which were earlier with the Punjab cadre IAS officers, Mann said.

Key departments like health, education, industries, agriculture, labour and employment, information technology, food and supplies, cooperation, sports and the Chandigarh Housing Board, which were earlier with the finance secretary, have been given to much junior AGMUT cadre IAS officers, he said.

Mann said the post of the managing director, CITCO (Chandigarh Industrial and Tourism Development Corporation Limited), which is reserved for a Punjab cadre IAS officer, has also been given to a UT cadre IAS officer.

The officers without requisite experience and knowledge of Chandigarh and intricate linkages with issues of Punjab and Haryana often dither in taking swift decisions and implementing the ones taken, pointed out Mann.

He said, "It has a negative bearing on the quality of governance and administration."

"These developments are in clear violation of the spirit of Punjab Reorganisation Act, 1966 and undermine the status and morale of Punjab officers," he said.