No more choosing cadre, IAS couples can get ready for states short of babus

The Ministry of Personnel’s unwritten convention that allows married couples, who have just joined the civil services, to choose their ...

The Ministry of Personnel’s unwritten convention that allows married couples, who have just joined the civil services, to choose their state cadre is about to be rewritten.

The Centre may soon ensure that such couples will be allotted cadres based solely on the administrative needs of various states, said sources.

So far, if the husband, for example, was from the Tripura cadre and the wife from Kerala, the two would have been allotted a common state cadre of their choice. But now, they will be sent to cadres that are facing a shortage of officers.

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According to the sources, the Cabinet Secretariat has held back requests for cadre change and allotment in the same state from couples, pending a decision from the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO).

On the same vein, the Centre has also reversed the previous NDA regime’s policy of not allowing secretaries the right to choose bureaucrats for their own ministries. The first step, as part of this policy introduced by Cabinet Secretary B K Chaturvedi last month, was the restructuring of the Civil Service Board (CSB), which clears the panel of bureaucrats for a particular vacancy in a ministry.

Chaturvedi’s predecessor Kamal Pande had followed a policy where CSB was chaired by the Cabinet Secretary with the Establishment Officer, Secretary (Personnel) and any one secretary from the government—on a rotational basis— as members.

The secretary of the ministry with the vacancy did not have a say in the matter as it was feared that he would to prone to lobbying from various quarters.

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The CSB will still be chaired by the Cabinet Secretary but will also have the Establishment Officer, Secretary (Personnel), Secretary (Planning Commission) and the Secretary of the ministry where there is a vacancy.

The idea: ensure that the right officer is chosen to meet the job requirements.

In the previous regimes, the panel of officers finalised by the CSB was often returned as the minister did not find anyone suitable for the job.

Now, the CVs of officers in the panel are vetted through the online system to match the requirements.