CHENNAI CORPORATION: Bureaucratic hurdles delay appointments

Source:http://expressbuzz.com/cities/chennai/bureaucratic-hurdles-delay-appointments/222436.html

By G Saravanan
Published in The New Indian Express, Chennai, on November 12, 2010:
CHENNAI: While Mayor M Subramanian announced a ‘final exit date’ to Neel Metal Fanalca for its sluggish conservancy operations in the city months ago, the civic body’s alternative plan to replace the private agency with large-scale recruitment has hit bureaucratic hurdles.

Though the resolution to recruit about 5,887 conservancy staff to “take over” the NMF’s operations from its four zones was adopted in the Council six months ago and the job interviews for selecting the candidates were completed by September, the files related to the sanction “was moving” at snail’s pace.

The reason behind the delay in according sanction (by state government) for mass recruitment has been linked to the Corporation’s financial status in meeting the additional expenditure.

Though the government’s standing order limits local bodies to spend only 49 per cent of their total revenue receipts towards staff salary, Chennai Corporation has exceeded the limit and the planned mass recruitment would further divert funds meant for public welfare schemes.

Claiming that the civic body’s financial condition was in ‘safe zone,’ Commissioner D Karthikeyan told Express that the Corporation was spending about 55 percent of its (total) revenue for its employees as salary and other benefits.

“Since the civic body has exceeded the limit, we need to get permission from the state government for the recruitment, Karthikeyan said.

According to sources, the Corporation’s revenue receipt in 2009-10 was around Rs 1,100 crores and it had spent over Rs 600 crores as staff salary during the period.

However, after the implementation of the Sixth Pay Commission recommendations few months ago, allocation for salary and other perks for the staff had increased by another 30 per cent.  

It may be noted that the civic body needs to cough up an additional Rs 62 crore per year to fulfill the financial commitments to the 5887-conservancy staff.