Fiscal Discipline - Tighten Your Belts -Fin Sec - No Creation of new posts; no filling up of posts vacant for more than year
THE Government is apparently reeling under a fiscal crisis and they want small cogs to plug the big holes. The Finance Secretary has announced a slew of measures for fiscal prudence and economy with immediate effect.
Cut in Non Plan Expenditure: For the Fiscal 2013-14, every Ministry/Department shall effect a mandatory 10% cut in non plan expenditure.
Seminars and Conferences: 10% cut - No meetings and conferences in five star hotels.
Purchase of vehicles: Purchase of vehicles is banned until further orders, except against condemned vehicles.
Travel: All officers are to travel in economy class only for domestic travel, except officers in the Apex Scale who may travel in executive class.
Creation of Posts:
(i) There will be a total ban on creation of Plan and Non-Plan posts.
(ii) Posts that have remained vacant for more than a year are not to be revived except under very rare and unavoidable circumstances and after seeking clearance of Department of Expenditure.
Will this mean that promotions and cadre review in the Revenue Departments are off? Many of the vacancies are more than a year old and they cannot be filled up now. In a recent Report to Parliament, the Public Accounts Committee commented on cadre review, "The DoPT has now shifted the onus for delay in approval of the same to the economy instructions issued by the Department of Expenditure. The Committee feel that the purpose of any economy instruction should be to ensure that the outgo from the Government's non-plan expenditure is minimised. Such restrictions do not hold good for a department like the Department of Revenue which is designed to augment the revenue for the Government.”