Disciplinary action proceedings commence against erring State govt. staff facing charges

The State government has finally started disciplinary action against employees at various levels to avoid delay between the occurrence of actual offence/irregularity and framing of charges.

Acting swiftly on the basis of orders issued fixing timelines for completing proceedings in cases where disciplinary action is needed to be taken, the government has suspended several employees from service while it is in the process of registering cases against hundreds more. “In all, around 500 employees are under suspension. More than 1,200 are facing disciplinary action,” a senior official told The Hindu.

Steps have been initiated to gather information pertaining to the cases which remained unaddressed since long even as sources said a couple of hundreds of files recommending disciplinary action against erring staff are pending clearance from the higher ups for several months now. The development follows the orders issued in August (GO Ms 175 dated August 21) recommending timelines for completion of disciplinary proceedings.

Provisions under the Telangana Civil Services (Classification, Control and Appeal) Rules, 1991 (Telangana Adaption Orders, 2016) and the Andhra Pradesh Revised Pension Rules, 1980 (Telangana Adaption Orders, 2016) empower the government to initiate action, including criminal proceedings, by filing charge sheets in a Court of Law.

Time and again instructions are being issued for expeditious completion of inquiries where departmental action is initiated in order to punish the guilty. However, it has been noticed that considerable time is being consumed in processing the files relating to disciplinary cases at various levels.

The process is so delayed that the charged officer, in many cases, retired from service or the charges are framed at the verge of retirement thereby sometimes resulting in the government servant escaping from punishment. The order fulfil was issued fulfilling one of the major demands of the employees unions which had been insisting that the government appoint a committee to speed up inquiry into the cases in a time bound manner so that they could be absorbed into duties at the earliest.