Centre tightens the screw on babus’ foreign trips

NEW DELHI: Tightening the screw on foreign junkets of bureaucrats, the Centre has come out with new guidelines seeking more details of proposed visit of ‘ babus’ if they want to get mandatory government clearance for going abroad. Under the guidelines, the bureaucrats will not only have to give details of the “sponsoring authority” and all information relating to expenditure of the proposed visit but also submit a “write up” if they are supposed to attend a conference/seminar in foreign countries.

Officers will have to comply with it irrespective of whether they intend to go abroad on personal or official visit. The expenditure details which are supposed to be submitted include air fare and approximate costs of food and lodging. All the information needs to be passed on to the concerned ministries at least 15 days before the scheduled visit.

Though these guidelines will be meant for all bureaucrats across the country, the Centre to begin with has circulated it for officers of the Delhi and Andaman & Nicobar Islands Civil/Police Services ( DANICS and DANIPS).
The home ministry had on June 26 sent an ‘office memorandum’ (OM) comprising these guidelines to chief secretaries of Delhi and A&N Islands, administrators of Daman & Die and Lakshadweep and Delhi Police commissioner.

The new guidelines came in the backdrop of a note from home secretary R K Singh who in April wrote to all central ministries mentioning how the government had come across instances where officers at different levels had been in touch with foreign nationals or embassy staffers of other countries for being nominated for courses abroad. Asking all senior officers not to mingle with foreigners working with different embassies or high commissions, Singh, in his note to secretaries on April 3, had said, “Such contacts give an opportunity to foreign service nationals and embassy officers\staffers (some of whom may be intelligence operatives ) to cultivate sources within the government and \or push their agenda.”

Although the provision to disclose ‘details’ of foreign visits are there in the service rule books of bureaucrats, the new guidelines will help the government in getting complete information in advance before sanctioning the journey.