INCOME TAX EMPLOYEES FEDERATION
Manishinath Bhawan A/2/95 Rajouri Garden,New Delhi. 110 027.
www.itef.blogspot.com email: itefcentral@gmail.com.
Telefax. 2510 5321; 6543 1807
Cir. No. 12
Dear Comrades,
The representatives of ITEF were called by the Chairman, CBDT for a meeting on 4.11.2011 to discuss the following two issues.
(i) Hiring of DEOs
(ii) Outsourcing Data entry functions in the CPCs
ITEF was represented by Com. K.P Rajgopal, President, Com. Ashok Salunkhe, Secretary General, Com Hari Om, Vice President, Com. Yeshwant Purohit, Jt. Secretary and Com. Rupak Sarkar, Finance Secretary. From the Official side, The Chairman, Member (P &V), Member (L), DG (System), DG(HRD) CIT (Coord) and other officials participated in the meeting on behalf of the official side..
It was informed that the Official side has accepted the following suggestions of the sub-committee in the matter of hiring of DEOs:
1. As a first option, the entire TAs/Sr TAs would be deployed to carry out all the departmental functions including typing work wherever required.
2. Qualified candidates would be recruited from the concerned Regional) employment exchanges to fill up the existing vacancies in the cadre of Stenographers purely on a temporary basis by the concerned authority and ITEF will provide all possible assistance for this.
3. In case both the above measures do not yield the desired result within the next two months other steps to temporarilyfill up the vacancies will be taken.
As you are aware, “outsourcing is one of the means adopted by the Government to reduce the staff strength in Govt. offices. It is nothing but sheer exploitation of the acute unemployment existing in the society. We know the volume of data entry work in the Department would come down over the years, once the e-filing gets momentum. The present proposal to contractorise the data entry work is to take advantage of the shortage of manpower. The shortage has been purposely created. During the nine years when the ban on recruitment was in vogue, thousands of Group C and D posts were abolished whereas not a single post of Gr.A was touched though the Govt. order on optimization covered all Groups including Group A. Besides, during the same period number of posts in Group A was added to the sanctioned strength despite the Government’s inability to fill up even the existing Group A posts. The proposal to hire DEO on contract basis is said to be to combat the situation emerging from the non availability of skilled stenographers in the market. Had the cadre composition been decided upon as per the recommendation of the 6th CPC this problem could have been addressed long time back. The cadre restructuring proposal which is now pending decision of the Government for several years, as you all know has identified the shortage of staff and has suggested remedial measures. Once the Govt. gives its seal of approval to the proposal, the shortage of staff would be effectively tackled. The contractorisation proposal if agreed upon will only further delay the final decision on the cadre restructuring of the Department. We must not allow this to happen as it would ultimately render the regular employees presently working as Tax Assistants, Senior Tax assistants etc. redundant and they would be sidelined in the days to come. Serious efforts must be undertaken to root out the menace. Only through a stiff resistance we would be able to save our job and employment. We must unleash an intensified campaign amongst our members to bring home the danger ahead in this regard. It is a long drawn out battle but we will succeed for we must. Wherever vacancies are enormous, the Circles should ask the local administration to resort to the second option mentioned above purely as a temporary measure.
In the matter of CPC, as you all know, the Board did not bide by the terms of agreement reached earlier. In Bangalore INFOSYs was entrusted with the entire functioning of the CPC. Despite several rounds of discussion, the CPC set up did not agree to deploy departmental personnel in the CPC. On several occasions, we had pointed out that the Service Provider must not be permitted to do the jobs which are supposed to be done by the Department. Processing of returns has been almost handed over to Infosys. No review was undertaken by the Department despite large number of complaints received from the tax paying public. Our Comrades in Karnataka has put up stiff resistance in so far as lifting the returns are concerned. Two more CPCs have come up, one at Pune and another atManesuar (NW region) The Department wanted to operationalise it in the same manner as was the case of Bangalore. No agreement could be reached during the discussion on 4th November,2011. We would be compelled to launch countrywide struggles if no settlement is reached in the matter. The members of the Sectt. Have been informed of the failure of negotiation in the matter. It will take appropriate decision shortly.
March to Parliament on 25th November, 2011. As intimated to you in our last circular dated 29.9.2011, the ITEF will have to muster the participation of atleast 1000 members in the March to Parliament which is being jointly organised by Confederation, All India State Govt. Employees Federation, BSNL, Bank Employees unions, Defence Employees. In order to make the programme a grand success, the Circle General Secretaries are requested to ensure the participation of the respective number of comrades fixed for each Circle..
XXVIII All India Conference at Mehsana (Gujarat). You have been informed by our earlier circular as also by a letter from the Gujarat circle about the preparation for the ensuing 28th All India Conference to be held at Mehsana. The Gujarat Circle has also sent sufficient number of Advertisement tariffs to enable you to raise funds for the Conference. it should be the endeavor of all of us to help them host the Conference. Therefore you are once again requested to ensure that the amount fixed by the Secretariat for each circle is raised through collection of Advertisement for the Souvenir and directly senT to the General Secretary, ITEF, Gujarat Circle. Since funds are required even for the preliminary & preparatory work , the funds collected may kindly be sent to the Gujarath Circle immediately..
With greetings,
Yours fraternally.,
Secretary General