Better monitoring required for delivery on 100-day tasks

SUBHASH RAI
GANGTOK: When Chief Minister Pawan Chamling assigned 100-day tasks to 30 Departments through a 109-page document on 18 April, people hoped that all the long-pending jobs locked in official files will be processed and delivered. Out of 100, 36 days are past and most of these files are still awaiting the go ahead command.
A reason why the 100-day tasks are running slow on delivery is speculated to be the recent reshuffle in the State administration from the C to A grade employees.
A Special Secretary informs that seven junior officials at his Department were transferred/ promoted to other Departments and till date no one has been sent in their place. This is bound to slow down work.
Not only this, the Chief Minister’s 40-day door-to-door visit will provide another excuse for the tardy bureaucratic system for not meeting the targets within the prescribed deadline.

“The Secretary is on tour with the Chief Minister and I am not a competent authority to make any statements,” said a joint secretary, when asked what progress his Department has made in regard to the tasks. This, despite the fact that second-in-commands have been authorized and directed not to allow departmental works to slacken in the absence of the HoDs.
It is also found that till date, very few Departments have formed monitoring committees for the tasks delegated to them, despite of the CM’s clear direction that all the departments mandatorily set up these cells which will report to the Chief Minister’s Office directly, with periodic updates and status reports on works being done by the respective departments.
With the announcement, the Chief Minister, as hinted earlier, tried to inject a delivery-centric work culture in the State administration. It is to be hoped that they will be able to achieve at least half of the targets set for them within the remaining 64 days so that a proper track-record is created for continuous and speedy development in future.
The Chief Minister has been frank in admitting that the public representatives and public servants have been less than average in performance. A list of tasks for 100-days was obviously planned as setting clear direction and targets to shake off bureaucratic lethargy. The administration however, has been slow on the uptake.
One of the tasks, for example, announced by the Chief Minister was to regularize the Muster Roll, Adhoc and Workcharged employees as per norms. Given the progress thus far, it seems, within 100 days, the Departments will barely be able to the prepare seniority lists of the around 13,000 thousands employees.
When he said, “as per norms”, the Chief Minister probably meant against availability of posts and budget allocation. Some of the Departments, which had already completed seniority lists of the temporary employees, have sent proposals to the Department of Personnel to fill up vacant posts.
A senior official told NOW! that more than 50 posts are lying vacant with his Department and even after receiving Cabinet approval, the appointments could not be made. The reason, the Finance Department returned the file directing to re-submit after allocating the budget.
While it is understandable that not all tasks listed out in the 109-page document will be delivered within the 100-day timeframe, it is important for the Departments to realize that it was perhaps not even intended as such – what was expected was for all the tasks to be processed earnestly and the processes expedited so that delivery in ensured. Monitoring, by way of a cell tasked with specific directions to do so, would have been the first step because in its absence, the tasks will depend, like always, on the commitment of individual officers and not be institutionalized as intended.