NATIONAL VOTER’S DAY IS 25TH JANUARY – DECLARATION BY GOVT. OF INDIA

Declaration of 25th January as the National Voters’ Day every year The Union Cabinet today approved declaration of 25th January every year as the "National Voters' Day" beginning from this year and to provide voters a badge with its logo and the slogan “Proud to be a voter – Ready to vote”.
The Constitution (Sixty-first Amendment) Act, 1988 was enacted to amend article 326 of the Constitution lowering the voting age from 21 years to 18 years so as to provide the unrepresented youth of the country an opportunity to give vent to their feelings and help them become a part of the political process.
It has been noticed that the new voters (18+ age) are not getting enrolled in the electoral roll in a big way year after year. In certain cases, the level of their enrolment is as low as 20 to 25%. In order to effectively deal with this problem, the Election Commission has decided to take up a vigorous exercise to identify all eligible voters attaining the age of 18 years as on 1st of January every year, in each of the 8.5 lakh polling station areas of the country. Such eligible voters shall be enrolled on time and handed over their Elector Photo Identity Card (EPIC) on the 25lh January every year at a brief felicitation to be organised in each polling station area. This initiation is expected to give the youth a sense of responsible citizenship, empowerment, pride and participation and inspire them to exercise their newly acquired franchise, when occasion arises.

A FAVOURABLE PRONOUNCEMENT ON RETIREMENT BENEFITS – MADRAS HIGH COURT

Retirement benefit can not be denied to employee  even if charges against him are pending The Madurai bench of the Madras High Court has ruled that Government cannot deny retirement benefits to an employee who was asked to go on conditional retirement because charges against him were pending. A Division Bench of Justice R.Banumathi and Justice S.Nagamuthu rejected the contention of the government that Sankaran, an Assistant Tahsildhar had been allowed to retire on certain conditions as charges were pending against him,and hence he could not be given retirement benefits.
A single judge had already revoked the order of the collector suspending payment of retirement benefits.
Similarly Raja,a retired Sub-Registrar of cooperatives was allowed conditional retirement on April 30, 2010. But his retirement benefits were suspended as charges were pending against him. His writ petition was dismissed by a single judge, and he had come on appeal.
The Judges said when the Government employees are allowed to retire on condition, disciplinary action could be taken against them or inquiry conducted afresh. But government had no power to suspend payment of retirement benefits to them, the court said.
In a common order passed for both of them, the bench said when they are allowed to retire they should be given their retirement benefits.
Only government had power to take decision on disciplinary action against them, the bench observed and directed that all retirement benefits be paid to them.
(Source: other web page)

Posting of women employees

No. 137-10/2011-SPB.II

Government of India

Ministry of Communications & IT

Department of Posts

Dak Bhawan, Sansad Marg New Delhi,

                                                                                                                                           

                                                                                                               Dated the 18th Jan, 2011

To
All Chief Postmasters General
All Postmasters General
All Postal Training Centres
CGM, PLI Directorate, Chanakaya Puri Post Office Complex, New Delhi
                          
Subject: Posting of women employees – Reg.
Sir/Madam,
I am directed to say that during the meeting of the Departmental Council (JCM) held on 27.08.2010 under the Chairpersonship of Secretary (Posts), an item regarding non-posting of women employees where basic amenities are not available was raised by the Staff side. The Staff side has stated that a number of Post Offices/RMS Offices are not having all the basic amenities and women employees are finding it difficult to work in such places. The staff side has, therefore, demanded that women employees should not be posted to such offices before ensuring basic amenities in such places.
2. It was informed to the staff side that Dte has issued instructions vide letter No. 137-12/98-SPB.II, dated 29.04.1998 to all Postal Circles advising them to avoid posting of ladies staff where basic amenities are not available in the office. It was decided in the meeting by the Chairperson that instructions on the subject be reiterated to all Heads of circles for strictly compliance.
3. In the Directorate’s letter No. 137-12/98-SPB.II, dated 29.04.1998, it was inter-alia advised to avoid posting women employees where there are no basic and essential amenities for women, Circles are, therefore, requested to scrupulously follow these instructions before women employees are posted/transferred from one work place to other. It may be ensure that women employee is transferred to an office only after ensuring that basic and essential amenities for women are available there. The Circles are also requested to identify these offices which are lacking basic amenities and take action for providing them immediately.

Yours faithfully,

Sd/-

(Suraj Bhan)

Asstt. Director General (SPN)

FLASH NEWS (21.01.2011)

v The Revised Recruitment Rules for M.T.S (Group D) is expected to be released today (21.01.2011). Anyhow orders will be available on Monday and will be exhibited in the website.

v The revised Recruitment Rules for Postmen will also be released within two days. Instructions will be issued to all circle heads to fill up all the vacancies of Postmen/Group ‘D’ up to 31.12.2010 within a time frame.

v Com. M. Krishnan, Secretary General NFPE, K. V. Sridharan, General Secretary and Com. Iswar Singh Dabas General Secretary, P4 met Sri. P. K. Gopinath, Member (P), Postal Services Board on 21.01.2011 and discussed the following issues:

(a) Extension of time limit for submitting option for Postmasters cadre. We have requested that instructions may be issued to all Chief PMGs to fill up all norm based LSG, HSG II and HSG –I posts on regular basis holding DPCs and option may be finalized only after giving opportunity to all those promoted to LSG, HSG II and HSG –I thus.

(b) (b) MACP clarification as per West Bengal Chief PMG’s letter.

(c) (c) Charge sheets, Break-in-service (FR 17-A) orders issued by Mumbai West Division, Satara Division and Pune RMS Division in connection with 2010 September 7^th Strike.

(d) (e) Revision of wages of casual labourers and Part-time contingent employees and indiscriminate outsourcing of their work. Clarificaiton on their engagnement

(e) (f) Removing the hurdles in commencing Local training classes for newly recruited PA/SAs with particular reference to Tamilnadu Circle.

(f) Discontinuing double delivery system in metros especially in Tamilnadu.

Member (P) assured necessary intervention.

He informed that police verification is a must before sending candidates for PA/SA training. No deviation from the Government instructions can be made by the Postal Board in this regard.

Postmen Committee

v Postmen Committee met on 21.01.2011 at Dak Bhawan under the Chairmanship of DDG (MB). Com. M. Krishanan, Secretary General NFPE, Com. Iswar Singh Dabas, General Secretary P-4, Com. K. V. Sridharan, General Secretary, P3 represented NFPE in the meeting. Issues relating to Data entry work, Fixing minimum and maximum distance to be traversed by Postmen, filling up of all vacant posts of Postmen upto 2010 (inclusive of residual vacancies) were discussed in detail. DDG agreed that the Department will examine all the points raised by the Staff side and will come up with a final proposal in the next meeting. Next sitting will be held in March 2011.

Cadre Review

v A meeting related to cadre restructuring is scheduled to be held tomorrow (22.01.2011) at 11.00 hours. Com. M. Krishnan, Secretary General, NFPE alongwith Com. K. V. Sridharan and Com. Giriraj Singh members of the Committee will represent NFPE in the meeting. Details will be published after the meeting.

Let us meet in the next

H.O. wise Membership Verification Report under Orissa Circle 

is Available in below link.

 CLICK HERE TO SEE

India Post seeks actuarial consultant to weigh funds

NEW DELHI: India Post is set to appoint an actuarial consultant to value its various insurance funds, a move which forms precursor to bring its insurance business under control of sectoral regulator, insurance regulatory and development authority (IRDA).

The postal department has called for proposals from qualified actuaries to value its insurance scheme funds such as, post office life insurance fund (POLIF) and rural post office life insurance fund (RPOIF). The POIF had around 40 lakh policies while RPOIF had around 135 lakh policies at the end of March 2010.

            The department, which runs its postal life insurance (PLI) and rural postal life insurance (RPLI) schemes as an agency function of the finance ministry, earlier sought to set up a corporate entity to handle insurance schemes to give it autonomy in functioning. IRDA regulations mandate every life and non-life insurer to appoint an actuary with life insurance businesses mandated to have a permanent official for the post.

According to the letter of invitation (LoI) issued by the department, the actuary will analyze various aspects of the funds including their expenses and premium income to certify the solvency of the funds. The consulting actuary will initially be appointed for a period of two years, which can be extended later by one more year.

            Actuarial valuation are used to assess risk in the insurance and finance industries. For traditional life insurance, actuarial science focuses on analysis of mortality, production of life tables and application of compound interest to produce life insurance, annuities and endowment policies.

The department of posts have been lagging behind despite having a formidable distribution base of over 1.55 lakh post offices. The department has proposed to create a corporate entity to handle the schemes, a move that will liberate it to introduce innovative products that can compete with private players effectively.

The opinion of law ministry was also sought if IRDA could take control over the department’s insurance business. As per provision of the LIC Act, PLI is a ‘scheme run by central government’ . Hence it is neither a company nor a body corporate , but is part of a department of the central government. On the contrary , Insurance Act defines an ‘insurer’ as any individual or un-incorporated body of individuals or body corporate incorporated under law.

Even as the debate on regulatory control of postal life insurance goes on, the department has requested for greater autonomy to its insurance schemes as it looks to expand its financial services business. “Corporatization of the life insurance business will enable the postal department to compete with private insurance players on a level playing field,” said an official in the department, who asked not to be named.

Source: economic times, 13 Jan 2011

Centre taking steps to tackle shortage of medical faculty

Centre taking steps to tackle shortage of medical faculty

Bangalore, Jan 20 (PTI) Union Health Minister Ghulam Nabi Azad today said the Centre had taken a host of measures to address the shortage of human resource in the health sector, including relaxing the retirement age of medical teaching faculty to 70 years from the 2010-11 academic year.

Speaking at the 15th convocation ceremony of the National Institute of Mental Health here, he said the ministry hopes to address the shortage by amending regulations, relaxing norms in Medical Council Rules and commencing new schemes.

"To meet the shortage of specialists and faculty, the teacher-student ratio has been increased from 1:1 to 1:2. For the academic year 2010-11, nearly 4000 additional seats in different postgraduate courses in government medical colleges across the country have already been approved."

The minister hoped these initiatives would create an additional 10,000 post graduate seats in the next two years.

Source: PTI