April 14 - Dr Ambedkar's Birthday Declared Holiday
GOVERNMENT has decided to declare Monday, the 14th April 2014 as a closed holiday for all Central Government offices including Industrial Establishments. This holiday is also being notified under Section 25 of the Negotiable Instruments Act, 1881.
The Government has been notifying this day as a holiday every year since 1990. For the last twenty six years, the government had been separately notifying this holiday. Why can't it be included in the general list of closed holidays published before the beginning of every year?
There was a strange case before the Central Information Commission on this issue. The applicant asked the Ministry of Personnel, Public Grievances and Pensions:-
What is the criterion for declaring birthdays of departed leaders as gazetted holidays? Do leaders like Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose or Pandit Jawahar Lal Nehru not fulfil the criterion to have their birthdays also as national holidays on lines of birthdays of Mahatma Gandhi and Dr. BR Ambedkar? Is it fair that birthdays of leaders like Mahatma Gandhi or Dr. BR Ambedkar are made holidays contrary to their noble ideas of hard work?
The Ministry replied:-
1. There is a policy decision that no holiday should be declared on the birthday of any national leader other than that of Mahatma Gandhi.
2. Holiday on Dr. B.R. Ambedkar's birthday: It is not one of the regular annual holidays. However, since 1990 this occasion has been declared as a closed holiday for all Central Government administrative offices.
The persistent applicant pleaded, "I appeal that details and rules may be clearly mentioned under which Dr. B. R. Ambedkar's birthday is being observed as a closed holiday since 1990"
The Ministry gave a some what curious response:-
As per RTI Act Section 8 (I) Notwithstanding anything contained in this Act, there shall be no obligation to give any citizen,-(a) information, disclosure of which would prejudicially affect the sovereignty and integrity of India, therefore, under the provisions of Act, no information can be provided to the first Para of your appeal.
The Government feels that disclosure on the holiday would prejudicially affect the sovereignty and integrity of India!!!
The Government can at least save some paper by including this holiday in the general list of holidays or if that is not possible declaring this holiday also along with the general holidays list.
Just imagine the exercise they do every year. Somebody has to search for this file and put up a note like this.
Since 1990, Government has been declaring a holiday on the birthday of Dr. Ambedkar which falls this year on 14th April 2016. It may be considered whether we should declare a holiday this year also.
This file will go from Assistant to Section Officer to Under Secretary to Deputy Secretary to Joint Secretary to Secretary to minister and perhaps even the Prime Minister.
The file will come back to the Assistant through the same route and somewhere down the line, a Joint Secretary will issue directions to put up the orders. The Assistant will prepare a draft order and send it for the signature of the Deputy Secretary, strictly through the channel and it will come back to him again through the channel. He will get hundreds of copies made and they will be sent to all Ministries, offices, attached and subordinate, courts, banks PSUs etc, where also hundreds of copies will be made and further circulated. And this is being done regularly sincerely and without a miss for the last 26 years. Certainly, Dr. Ambedkar would not have approved.
There should be some ease of doing even government business.
DOPT OM in F No. -JCA-2, Dated: March 21, 2016