The wait for regular promotions has become a thorn in the flesh for the 25 officiating Deputy Superintendents of Police who have been shouldering additional responsibilities for over 15 months. Sources close to these officers claimed that the delay has demotivated them as they feel that their hard work and dedication have gone unnoticed and unappreciated.
“It’s been an unending wait. We are still in the dark about when we will get our regular promotions. We have been working hard and putting in extra hours, but it seems like it’s all for nothing,” an officer, who preferred to remain anonymous, said expressing his disappointment,
Sources close to the matter revealed that the delay is due to administrative issues and bureaucratic hurdles. “The file has moved for their regular promotions,” a Secretariat source said when asked about the current status of the matter. However, the officers remain skeptical, given the long wait they have already endured.
The 25 DySPs, currently posted at different sub-divisions and specialized units of Goa Police, were given officiating promotions starting from January 1, 2022. As per the government rules, the promotion of gazetted officers on “officiating” is only valid for one year after which they require the concurrence of the Goa Public Service Commission to retain their positions.
In the present case, the ad-hoc officers’ term ended on December 31, 2022. It was only in January 2023 that the government requested the Commission to extend the term by another year, which was outrightly rejected. The GPSC nevertheless granted a brief relief to complete the formalities by March 31, 2023. Now with the lapse of the second deadline too, the officers are in a bit of a tizzy fearing their designation would revert to Police Inspectors.
It is reliably learnt that despite the GPSC’s repeated directions, the department went ahead with the officiating promotions without any efforts to fill the vacancies either through promotion or direct recruitment.
Now with these promotions already carried out, the government has prepared a rooster to determine the reservation quota. It is further learnt that the roster was just recently verified by the Social Welfare Department and forwarded to the Home Department for necessary action. The government is also preparing the seniority list even as Chief Minister Pramod Sawant had last month granted a nod for regular promotions.
GPSC Chairman Jose Manual Noronha, on being contacted by The Goan stated, “We have not received a proposal (on regular promotions) as yet.”
The government on January 6 issued an order promoting 25 Police Inspectors to officiate as DySPs amid a hearing into a plea before the High Court of Bombay at Goa seeking elevation to the gazetted rank by promotions only.
“On recommendation of the Local Departmental Promotion Committee, The government is pleased to promote on officiating basis the following PIs to their post of Junior Scale Officers of Goa Police Service Group ‘A’ Gazetted… with immediate effect for a period of one year or till the posts are filled on regular basis, whichever is earlier,” the order by Under Secretary (Personnel-I) Nathine Araujo had stated, which was based on the approval from competent authority.
The PIs had challenged the first amendment in Goa Public Service Rules notified on December 5, 2011 where posts for DySPs were to be filled through direct recruitment terming the notification as ‘arbitrary and unreasonable’.
Before approaching the High Court, they petitioned the Chief Secretary and Director General of Police demanding the filling up of long pending posts of DySPs by promotion and insisted that the Promotion Quota for PI to DySP be changed to 100 per cent by promotion and no direct recruitment be made for filling these posts.
Several attempts to resume direct recruitment have failed for the last 22 years despite which promotions have also been delayed. Most of the current batch of ad-hoc officers remained in the post of PIs for 10-15 years before the conditional promotion.
