We don’t have power to monitor quota implementation by other Ministries and departments, says DoPT

Separate Ministries look into implementation of quota policy in its respective departments and subordinate offices, says DoPT, weeks after it released its annual report without data on reservation across Central Ministries and departments

The Department of Personnel and Training (DoPT) has clarified that it had no “power of superintendence” over other Ministries and departments to monitor the implementation of the reservation policy for the Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes, and the Other Backward Classes. 

This stand of the DoPT, which comes under the Ministry of Personnel, Public Grievances and Pensions, was made clear in an action-taken report tabled in Parliament last week (December 6) by the Parliamentary Standing Committee on the Welfare of Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes. This comes within weeks of the DoPT dropping data on reservation across Central Ministries and departments in its latest annual report – a first in at least two decades. 

Prime Minister Narendra Modi holds charge of the Ministry of Personnel, Public Grievances and Pensions. 

The report discusses the action taken by the government on issues raised by the House panel in its 25^th report on the Ministry’s role in the formulation, implementation, and monitoring of the reservation policy. The 25^th report, tabled in Parliament in July 2023, spoke of various issues including representation of SCs/STs on boards of Central public sector enterprises/ undertakings (CPSEs, PSUs), etc, representation in Central Ministries, backlog vacancies, reservation rosters, among others.  

Surprise checks

On the committee’s recommendation that the DoPT should conduct random surprise roster checking, the DoPT has cited the Transaction of Business Rules and Allocation of Business Rules to say, “All departments/Ministries are equal, and the Department of Personnel and Training has no power of superintendence over other Ministries to monitor the implementation of reservation policy.” 

It added that this was why each Ministry had been given the responsibility to monitor its implementation across all its respective departments and subordinate offices. Further, “keeping in view the large structure of the government of India”, it may not be possible for any single authority to monitor implementation of reservation throughout. And so, liaison officers had been mandated for the purpose in each Ministry and department, it said. 

The DoPT, however, added that a reservation roster was “not a confidential document” and that “there can be no objection in principle to the roster being shown to any individual/association”. 

In its comments, the parliamentary committee, headed by BJP MP Faggan Singh Kulaste, expressed dissatisfaction at the “self-satisfied stance taken by the Ministry/DoPT” that each Ministry was to implement the policy formulated by the DoPT.  

“The committee, on the basis of its vast interaction with the Ministries, departments, PSUs, banks, autonomous bodies etc., are of the considered view that the DoPT being the nodal Ministry, should devise a mechanism at its end to enable it to monitor and to ensure implementation of reservation roster as per DoPT guidelines in this regard,” the panel added in its report. The monitoring mechanism thus devised should be a “separate authority accountable to the DoPT”.

In the section on liaison officers, the committee further tore into the “claim of the DoPT that they are well-trained and efficient enough to watch over implementation of reservation policy”. It said its interactions with these officers and accompanying witnesses across organisations, Ministries and departments had shown that they were “not able to respond to simple queries with respect to vacancies for SCs/STs, status of reservation rosters, lapses if any in implementing reservation rules, etc.” It added that many liaison officers were found lacking knowledge and basic information on reservation rosters.

Poor representation

In the discussions on representation of the SCs and the STs across the Central government posts, the committee noted that it had already highlighted lack of representation in Groups A, B, and C respectively. In response, the government cited data from January 1, 2022, to say, “The representation of SC and ST is equal to or more than the prescribed quota in Groups B and C. The overall representation of SC and ST is also more than the prescribed quota.” 

This prompted the House panel to seek afresh data on representation of the SCs and the STs in the Central government across Groups B and C, and steps it had taken to achieve mandated representation in Group A posts.  

The last public data on reservation in Central government posts is from January 1, 2022. This was made available by the DoPT in its annual report for 2022-23. This accounted for about 19 lakh of the over 30 lakh people employed by the Centre. As per this data, SCs, STs, and OBCs were under-represented in Group A posts at 13.21%, 6.01%, and 18.07% respectively. Across Groups B and C, OBCs were under-represented. In Group B and C (excluding Safai Karmacharis), STs were 7.39% and SCs 15.3% and 16.7%. For posts in Group C (including Safai Karmacharis), SCs were 35.33%, STs 7.05%, and OBCs 17.89%.  

The action-taken report with the panel’s comments tabled on December 6, was considered and adopted by the committee after it was reconstituted following the beginning of the 18^th Lok Sabha. 

In the action-taken report, the parliamentary committee had also reiterated its earlier recommendations on the need for an independent mechanism to monitor the implementation of the reservation policy across Ministries, departments. It also demanded representation of SCs and STs on the boards of Central public sector enteprises, public sector banks, etc.

Published - December 11, 2024 09:00 pm IST