States prematurely retired only one out of 549 IAS officers under review

NEW DELHI: Only one IAS officer across the country was prematurely retired from service on grounds of inefficiency in last three years. Various states reviewed the records of 549 officers but found all but one fit to continue in service despite some facing disciplinary action. Six states, including West Bengal and Andhra Pradesh, are still to hold a review meeting.

This has been revealed ahead of a meeting to be held by the Centre with all states next week. There is an existing provision in law regarding review of service records of All-India Service officers who have completed either 15 or 25 years of qualifying service or on attaining the age of 50 years. “The object of the Rule is to weed out the deadwood in order to maintain a high standard of efficiency and initiative in the State Services. It is not necessary that a good officer may continue to be efficient for all times to come. There may be some officers who may possess a better initiative and higher standard of efficiency and if given chance the work of the Government might show marked improvement. The rule merely seeks to strike a just balance between maintenance of efficacy in the diverse activities of state administration and cessation of completed career of an officer whose integrity is doubtful and his services are no longer useful to the administration and public,” the DoPT has mentioned in agenda document for the meeting.

The reports furnished by states with respect to such reviews have been attached to the agenda – they show only one officer has been prematurely retired since 2013 from the AGMUT cadre though the records of 549 officers were reviewed. Bihar reviewed cases of 19 officers but found all of them fit to continue in service including one officer against whom departmental proceedings are pending. Chhattisgarh also found all its 33 reviewed officers fit to continue despite one of them being under watch. Out of 44 officers reviewed by Punjab, the state found all of them fit to continue in service including 4 officers against whom departmental proceedings are pending. UP also found all 58 officers under review fit to continue despite two of them facing departmental proceedings, the agenda says.

The Centre is still awaiting minutes of the meetings held by Nagaland, Tripura, Kerala, Tamil Nadu, Telangana and Karnataka while “West Bengal has assured holding the Review Committee meeting,” the agenda document says. “Information is awaited from the States of J&K, Manipur, Andhra Pradesh, Sikkim and Uttarakhand regarding formation of the Review Committee and conduct of the meeting thereafter,” the agenda further says. The Centre has specified that the order of premature retirement can be passed only after having due regard to the entire service record of the officer. “The order of premature retirement is not to be treated as a punishment coming under Article 311 of Constitution. It may be kept in mind that the order of compulsory retirement shall not be passed as a short cut to avoid departmental enquiry when such course is more desirable. If the officer was given a promotion despite adverse entries made in the confidential record, that is a fact in favour of the officer,” the Centre says.

The intensive Review is proposed at two Stages while assessing the fitness of the officer on promotion to the STS levels and again for promotion to ASTS levels. If an officer is not found fit for promotion to these levels on successive two occasions, he/ she may be recommended for premature retirement.