Amritsar, April 27
Allegations of a promotion scam in the Irrigation Department are doing the rounds here. Reportedly, 19 Junior Engineers (JEs) were promoted as SDOs, superseding their colleagues.
It is learnt that the Punjab Engineering Services II Clause 5 Rules of 1941, which is used in the “rarest of promotional cases” and has never been used in the last three promotion segments of 1994, 1996 and 1997, was used to effect these promotions for a huge financial considerations throughout Punjab.
The amounts quoted by sources reveal that more than Rs 5-6 lakh changed hands for each promotion. Records and ACRs of those promoted were allegedly manipulated to confirm to the criteria and the promotions were effected in June 2001.
As a trial run, three out of the 19 promotions were first cleared in 2000. The very next year, the remaining promotions were effected on the basis of “outstanding’ record. However, many promotions on the same criterion are still in the pipeline and have not been cleared.
The above rule, which was used to effect these promotions, only applies to those cases where the departmental examinations were cleared and a minimum of 10 years of service had been put in, besides a good ACR. However, new ACRs were allegedly created in several cases to make the
candidate “eligible” for promotion. Copies of the original ACRs of some of the promotees are with The Tribune. In at least one case, the official who was to clear his departmental examinations in June, was given a recommendation two months earlier.
It has come to light that outstanding merit certificates were arranged in favour of a few JEs. Also in some cases which were recommended as “faultless”, it was found that inquiries were pending against the candidates and memorandums had been issued by the Vigilance Department against them.
Three such promotions were effected from Amritsar. Three others were promoted prior to this promotion list in 2000, ignoring the seniority of employees with more than 25 years of service.
The Drafts Rule Committee was formed by the government in 1999 and was headed by six members, including Secretaries Irrigation, B&R, and Public Health and three Chief Engineers.
The committee was to place its report on new quotas to be allotted to different categories for promotion before the government. However, taking advantage of this pending decision, new promotions were effected using the “outstanding criterion” which was to be used only in exceptional cases.
Chief Engineer S.S. Sandhu, when contacted, expressed his ignorance about the issue and said he had nothing to do with the promotions.
Meanwhile, members of the Diploma Engineers Association have taken up the issue with the Chief Minister, Capt Amarinder Singh, in a written complaint. they have demanded a high-level inquiry into this scam and urged the Chief Minister to see that the inquiry is held by the commission set up by the Punjab Government and headed by Justice A.S. Garg to probe into the “irregularities, illegalities, corruption and other misdoings” of the former government headed by Mr Parkash Singh Badal.
