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Centre tightens norms for babus' foreign junkets
Vishwa Mohan |TNN | Jul 11, 2012, 02.57AM IST
NEW DELHI: Tightening the screw on foreign junkets of bureaucrats, the Centre has come out with new guidelines seeking more details of proposed visit of 'babus' if they want to get mandatory government clearance for going abroad.
Under the guidelines, the bureaucrats will not only have to give details of the "sponsoring authority" and all information relating to expenditure of the proposed visit but also submit a "write up" if they are supposed to attend a conference/seminar in foreign countries.
Officers will have to comply with it irrespective of whether they intend to go abroad on personal or official visit. The expenditure details which are supposed to be submitted include air fare and approximate costs of food and lodging.
All these information need to be passed on to the concerned ministries at least 15 days before the scheduled visit. Though these guidelines will be meant for all bureaucrats across the country, the Centre to begin with has circulated it for officers of the Delhi and Andaman Nicobar Islands Civil/Police Services (DANICS and DANIPS).
The home ministry had on June 26 sent an 'office memorandum' (OM) comprising these guidelines to chief secretaries of Delhi and A&N Islands, administrators of Daman & Die and Lakshadweep and Delhi Police commissioner.
The new guidelines came in the backdrop of a note from home secretary R K Singh who in April wrote to all central ministries mentioning how the government had come across instances where officers at different levels had been in touch with foreign nationals or embassy staffers of other countries for being nominated for courses abroad.
Asking all senior officers not to mingle with foreigners working with different embassies or high commissions, Singh, in his note to secretaries on April 3, had said, "Such contacts give an opportunity to foreign service nationals and embassy officers\staffers (some of whom may be intelligence operatives) to cultivate sources within the government and\or push their agenda."
Although the provision to disclose 'details' of foreign visits are there in the service rule books of bureaucrats, the new guidelines will help the government in getting complete information in advance before sanctioning the journey.
The June 26 OM had stated that the government had to form the guidelines to regulate the issue of foreign visits as it was found that officers are often submit "incomplete" information and that too very late for getting "cadre clearance regarding ex-India visit\leave".
The OM, which is to be sent to all states for guiding regulation of foreign visits of officers, says that before forwarding any proposal to the concerned ministry, the state\UT administration should verify it in accordance with the extant guidelines issued by the central government.
It says: "Only those proposals which conform to the said guidelines should be forwarded to the ministry after due certification". On proposed visit of officers to attend any conference\seminar abroad, the guidelines want the bureaucrats to submit a write up as to how the conference\seminar is going to benefit him or his organization. The officers will also be required to submit his\her "report" once they come back after attending such conference or seminar.
"Such move will help government in regulating whether officers who are given clearance for foreign visits had actually gone for the purpose stated by them or for something else", said an official. He added that a mechanism to scrutinize other details will also be put in place in view of the new guidelines so that it could check any unnecessary contact of bureaucrats with foreigners as stated by the home secretary in his April note..................http://epaper.timesofindia.com/Repository/ml.asp?Ref=Q0FQLzIwMTIvMDcvMTEjQXIwMTMwMA==&Mode=Gif&Locale=english-skin-custom
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