KALABURAGI: A rare incident of demotion of over 100 employees of Revenue Department, including 68 Second Division Assistants/village Administrative Officers and 33 peons in Kalaburagi district, who were given promotion to the higher posts less than a year back, has taken place here.
According to the official sources, 68 employees (33 employees who were working as Second Division Assistants and 35 employees who were working as Village Development Officers) in different offices of revenue department in Kalaburagi district were promoted as First Division Assistant (FDA) and were also given posting on 18-05-2023 giving the benefit of scale of salary of FDA post with retrospective effect from 17-07-22021.
The sources said that it has come to light that the authority concerned headed by the then Deputy Commissioner did not consider the fact as to how many FDA posts were vacant when the promotions and posting to Second Division Assistants (SDAs) and Village Development Officers as First Division Assistants were given. It was also necessary to get the details of whether the employees getting promotion had faced any departmental inquiry and a final report was given on the inquiry. But this procedure was not followed while giving promotion, sources said.
Based on the letter of the President of Karnataka State Village Administrative Officers Association to the Secretary of Revenue Department to stop the process of giving promotion as the promotions had been given though there were no vacancies of FDA posts in Kalaburagi, the Secretary to the Revenue Department asked the Regional Commissioner and Deputy Commissioner to take necessary action and send compliance report to the government.
Based on this, an inquiry was conducted and the promotion order dated 18-05-2023 was withdrawn through a notification by the present Deputy Commissioner Fouzia Taranum on 14-02-2014 and the employees had been asked to go back to their original post which they were holding before the promotion.
DC’s response
DC Fouzia Taranum told TNIE that she has followed the directions of the State government.
The seniority list of ‘D’ Group employees working in the district has been published on 16-02-2024 and the employees concerned can file their objections if any within 15 days.