Implementation of retired employees’ termination orders comes under scanner

On March 25, Chief Secretary A Santhi Kumari issued orders instructing Special Chief Secretaries, Principal Secretaries, Secretaries, and Special Secretaries to end the services of retired employees by March 31.

Hyderabad: The State government orders directing all departments to terminate services of retired officers, who were working on contract or outsourcing basis, is coming under scanner with a few departments appealing to continue the services of many of the retired employees.

On March 25, Chief Secretary A Santhi Kumari issued orders directing the Special Chief Secretaries, Principal Secretaries, Secretaries and Special Secretaries to terminate the services of retired employees by March 31.

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Departments, which require the services of the retired officers, were directed to obtain fresh orders with justification from the competent authority.

Accordingly, it was expected that services of over 6,700 retired employees would be terminated from different departments. It is believed that 177 senior rank officers from municipal administration, 179 from industries, and 45 from Panchayat Raj departments were shortlisted for removal from service.

Many employees associations had welcomed the move stating that officers, who were due for promotions, would get promotions and many vacancies would be filled up.

However, in sharp contrast to these orders, many departments have appealed to the government to reinstate the retired officers, citing different reasons.

A few departments wanted to utilize the expertise of the retired employees. Others said more vacancies would arise and would affect the department’s operations with skeletal staff in the wake of implementing the orders.

A few retired officers, including in the ranks of Secretaries, Managing Director, and Chief Engineers etc have already managed to get orders in their favour. Such cases have been reported from municipal administration, panchayat raj, irrigation and a few other departments. HODs are tight-lipped in sharing the details of retired officers, who have been given extension.

This is despite employees protesting against the department’s plans to retain them in the respective positions. For instance, employees of Streenidhi Credit Cooperative Federation approached a few Ministers and submitted representations complaining about the department’s plans to retain services of a few retired officers.

It was unfortunate that a few departments were appealing to the government to retain the services of many retired officers, which was defeating the very purpose of the Chief Secretary’s orders, an office bearer of Joint Action Committee of Telangana Employees, Gazetted Officers, Teachers, Workers and Pensioners said.

“Fearing backlash from employees, nothing is being done transparently. This issue of extending the services of retired officers will be taken up with the government,” the office bearer said.