New Delhi: The Centre of Indian Trade Union (CITU) on Thursday vehemently criticised the central government for adopting a policy of "forcible retirement" of employees.
Speaking to ETV Bharat, CITU general secretary and former Rajya Sabha MP, Tapan Sen said that entire trade union has opposed the "atrocious initiative" of the government, and added that it was a ploy for bigger outsourcing.
"It is not only limited to central government employees. The different state governments (especially BJP ruled states) are also adopting the same policy. In the central public sector, whose service condition is defined separately, the ministry is directing the management to incorporate this provision in the service condition of the employees empowering the management to forcibly retire people," Sen said.
Sen called it a very "atrocious" move and said it was not necessary.
"There are many vacancies in the central government, state government and in the public sector affecting the work of the departments," Sen said.
"Even in railways huge vacancies are there, particularly in safety-related areas and along with this, the Railways has decided to abolish the vacancies which continue to remain vacant for two years," he added.
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Sen said that the government is trying to create a ground facilitating for bigger outsourcing even in the government departments.
"Practically, the government departments are also privatised through the backdoor and to facilitate that process, the government has simultaneously taken the initiative to reduce the government deployment through this atrocious measure of forcible retirement in an unfounded way," Sen said.
It is pertinent to note that the Department of Personnel and Training's (DoPT) order allows it to prematurely retire government servants even if they are within the 50 to 55 age bracket or have completed 30 years of service.
The initiative was part of the Central government's drive to weed out 'inefficient' and 'corrupt' officials.
The order also stated that no government employee will, ordinarily, be retired if found to be ineffective if he or she is expected to be retiring on superannuation within a period of one year from the date at which his or her case is being considered.
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Sen, however, said that some officers will be assigned with the responsibility to take the call for forcible retirement of a particular individual.
"There is no scope of defending on the part of the particular employee. Whereas the basic service condition demands that such action against any employee can't be taken without giving him or her a chance for self-defence...This is the most dangerous trend not only for the workers and employees but for the whole democratic system of the country," Sen said.
