Centre reorients service rules for all-India cadres in NE

Agartala, July 29 (UNI) The Centre has re-oriented the service rules and provided incentives for bureaucrats serving in Northeastern states to attract the employees of all-India services to the region.

Official sources said here today.

The Centre had liberalised the rules allowing IAS and IPS officials, belonging to the cadres of Tripura, Manipur, Asom, Meghalaya, Nagaland and Sikkim, to opt for voluntary retirement after 15 years of service, five years before those based in other states, thay said.

The decision was one of a series of measures recommended by the committee, chaired by former Revenue Secretary Vineeta Rai, which was constituted soon after the government tightened rules, placing restrictions on allowing all-India service officers to change their cadre.

Sources said the officers, desperate to change their cadre from NE states, would get married to a colleague and ask the Centre to post them to a third state.

The new rules stipulated that if two officers, allotted a cadre in NE married, only one of them could change their cadre. Only if the state governments concerned refused to accommodate the second person, they could be allotted to a third state.

However, the rules, intended to ensure that NE did not fall short of officers, stipulated that the government would identify the third state and not the officers.

The recent Vaidyanathan Committee reports, reviewing the IAS induction syllabus, had noted how the first reaction of most officer trainees allotted to these cadres was one of ''angst and apprehension'' and recommended counseling for them at the Civil Service Institute.

In line with the Vineeta Rai Committee recommendations, the Department of Personnel and Training also allowed officers posted to the region to give a list of three states where they would like to settle down after retirement.

According to the rule, these officers would then be treated at par for post-retirement housing with officers of the selected states. The government also allowed officers allotted to the NE to avail Leave Travel Allowance every year while serving in NE and Children's Education Allowance at par with IFS officers serving abroad.

Besides, the officers and their families would be entitled to air travel on referrals to super-specialty hospitals in emergency situations, while women officers, serving in NE, would be allowed to use army hospitals, in addition to existing facilities, official sources said.

UNI