Kerala - Thiruvananthapuram

Redeployment of staff to LSGIs comes to a halt

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Redeployment of engineering staff from the Public Works and Irrigation Departments to local self-government institutions (LSGIs) seems to have run aground owing to lack of cooperation of the parent departments.

Shortage of engineering staff in civic bodies had already affected the pace of execution of Plan works as well as the number of jobs taken up under the National Rural Employment Guarantee Programme (NREGP).

The government has not been able to honour its promise to provide at least one assistant engineer for two panchayats and many of the civic chiefs have to cope with increased work pressure.

The Local Self-Government Department would need 530 engineers as per the original plan to fulfil the commitment.

On completing the redeployment process, 480 engineers would have made their way into the department. With the process getting embroiled in intra-departmental disputes, the process has returned a net shortage of 230 engineers.

This is in addition to the shortage of overseers and administrative staff.

Engineers were told to opt for service in the LSGIs. Since the response was far from satisfactory, it was decided to redeploy 140 junior engineers from the Public Works Department.

After the process got going and six of them were shifted to the civic bodies, they secured a stay order bringing the exercise to a halt.

Following the government decision, the PWD had abolished the posts and the engineers have been retained in their parent department itself.

The Irrigation Department is understood to have taken a stance that it has kicked off various new projects of late and hence no surplus staff could be identified for being redeployed to the civic bodies.

A vast majority of the LSGIs are executing civil works to the tune of Rs.5 crore a year and almost all functions such as preparation of estimate, checking quality and measurement of the completed works have all become a Herculean task for civic chiefs.

Some of them do it in an amateurish fashion and others opt to shelve the works for want of technical staff. Enforcement of building rules too has been affected.

Official sources said the PWD has not made any serious effort so far to move the High Court to vacate the stay orders.

The Local Self-Government Department has resolved to approach the court to secure the services of the PWD engineers, sources said.

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