The
CBEC in real sense does not want to solve the actual problem for not making a suitable provision in RRs
that the senior Central Excise Executive officers shall not work under their extreme juniors of Customs
recruited in the same cadre in the same organization under the same department
of Revenue of the same Ministry of Finance due to the reasons best known only
to the concerned authorities themselves. If such a provision is being
stipulated in the RRs , then the juniors either of Central Excise or of Customs cannot get early promotion than their natural seniors of inter cadre or intra cadre. It seems that no authority is
interested to undo the injustice being faced by the Central Excise executive
officers for last many decades. Perhaps no body in CBEC understands the pain of
working under the juniors. Inter-grade (Central Excise vs. Customs) disparities
are being diverted to the intra-grade (Central Excise vs. Central Excise)
disparities by the CBEC to benefit a particular category of Customs. By it, the
Central Excise Executive officers will keep retiring on getting either one or two promotions in their
service career whereas the Customs
personnel recruited as Examiner & Appraisers shall keep enjoying by getting 5 to 6 promotions. The Inspectors
of Central Excise, Preventive Officers and Examiners of Customs all are
mentioned as Inspector only (belonging to one & the same single cadre of
Inspector) in the recruitment rules as below-
i)
Inspector of Central Excise & Land Customs.
ii)
Inspector (Preventive Officer) and
iii)
Inspector (Examiner).
It is very clear from the above that the
Inspector of Central Excise is also mentioned as Inspector of Land Customs in
the recruitment rules. Thus, he/she doesn’t only perform the duties
relating to Central Excise & Service Tax but also performs the duties
relating to Customs. All of the above 3 categories of Inspector are promoted to
the post of Superintendent of Central Excise & Land Customs, Superintendent
of Customs and Appraiser of Customs respectively and re-merged as Asstt.
Commissioner at group ‘A’ entry level belonging to one & the same single
cadre. But the Inspector of Central Excise & Land Customs is placed far
behind the Examiner during this process of promotion. As a result, the
Inspector of Central Excise & Land Customs of same year becomes junior even
by decades to the Inspector (Examiner) despite of being recruited to same cadre
through one & the same recruitment examination in one & the same
organization of CBEC of one & the same Department of Revenue under one
& the same Ministry of Finance. As a consequence, the officers joining as
Inspector in 1975 is still waiting to enter into group ‘A’ JTS while the
Examiner of 1992 or even later has already entered into the group ‘A’ STS. It
is also well pertinent to mention that the former category of officers is
performing more bulk of Customs work under the Central Excise formations than
the later one. This very well depicts that the former category of officers is
more expert than the later one not only in Customs work but also in the work of
Central Excise & Service Tax whereas later one has no work experience on
account of no exposure to any work relating to Central Excise & Service
Tax. Due to the faulty recruitments rules & discriminatory promotional
policy, the officers belonging to Central Excise & Land Customs are forced
to work under their extreme juniors of Customs (Examiners and Appraisers).
The stagnation being faced by the Central
Excise executive officers has very well been admitted by the CBEC in the Board
meetings of 12.01.1, 18.02.11 & 09.04.14 and also in the file F. No.
8/B/36/HRD (HRM)/2014 admitting as below-
i)
that the Central Excise executive officers are retiring with single promotion
in their service span of 35 years while the Examiners of Customs are reaching
the level of Additional Commissioner.
ii)
that the 1992 batch Examiner has already been promoted to the post of Asstt./Deputy
Commissioner while 1975 batch Inspector is still waiting for the same. Not only
it, the 1984 batch Examiner has already been promoted to the post of Joint
Commissioner while 1975 batch Inspector is still working as Superintendent.
iii)
that the Central Excise executive officers are retiring even without second
promotion due to the gap of 17 to 18 years between the Inspector and Examiner
in entering group ‘A’ and
iv)
it is required to give equal opportunity for promotion to group ‘A’ to these
officers.
The mere simple merger or preparation of
unified seniority list will never undo the above said disparities &
discrimination. These disparities can only be removed by bringing all the
Inspectors, Preventive officers and Examiners of same year to the same level of
promotion as also admitted by the CBEC on 18.01.11 during the presentation on
cadre restructuring saying that the matter is already under examination. The
counting of combined length of service or implementation of base cadre
seniority for promotion to group ‘A’ has also already been rejected in the
Board meeting of 12.01.11. Thus, the simple merger of above 3 categories or
unification of single category is of no use until batch to batch parity in
promotions is not brought for the officers belonging to above 3 categories of
Inspector.
This parity is very well possible by adopting
the measures like time bound promotions, notional promotions, creation of
supernumerary posts, creation of separate service, direct promotion to higher
post/s or any other specific measure/s and re-framing the RR’s in consonance of
the OM No. AB-14017/61/2008-Estt.(RR) dt.24.03.09 of DOPT (not being followed
by CBEC) clearly stipulating the promotion of Inspector completing 12, 17 &
20 years of service to the grade of JC, ADC & Commissioner respectively and
so on. The validity of this OM was also admitted by the CBEC during the
presentation of cadre restructuring proposal on 18.01.11 but they showed their
inability to implement the same due to the want of required number of
vacancies. As far as the problem of the want of required number of vacancies is
concerned, it can be solved by creation of the supernumerary posts or even by
in-situ promotions (requiring no creation of posts) with the clause of counting
the in-situ service for further promotions. Regarding the time bound
promotions, the CBEC itself recommended for the grant of time scales after
every 7 years to the 6th CPC for our executive officers as one of
the measures to solve the problem which may be utilised now as per own recommendations of
CBEC. The new RR’s may be framed
prescribing qualifying service as follows based on the above mentioned OM of
DOPT after unifying all of 3 categories into single stream (without
trifurcating the single cadre) at group ‘B’ non-gazetted (Inspector) as well as
group ‘B’ gazetted (Superintendent) level–
(i) 2
years for promotion to a post with a grade pay of Rs. 4,800/- after joining as
Inspector.
(ii)
7 years for promotion to a post with a grade pay of Rs. 6,600/- after joining
as Inspector (There is no justification of promoting an officer from a grade
pay of Rs. 5,400/- to 5,400/-. It is also submit-worthy that the most of the
group ‘B’ gazetted officers including CSS are being promoted to a senior group
‘A’ post instead of junior group ‘A’ in Central as well as State governments.).
(iii)
12 years for promotion to a post with a grade pay of Rs. 7,600/- after joining
as Inspector.
(iv)
17 years for promotion to a post with a grade pay of Rs. 8,700/- after joining
as Inspector.
(v)
20 years for promotion to a post with a grade pay of Rs. 10,000/- after joining
as Inspector.
(vi)
and so on.
In addition to the above qualifying services
and keeping in view the acute stagnation of the Central Excise executive
officers, there should kindly be incorporated the permanent provisions in
the recruitment rules at every level to promote the officer
automatically to the next higher grade, if his/her stagnation in a grade reaches
one & half times of qualifying service. Such provisions may be created
based on the precedent of promoting all the Section Officers (analogous to our
Superintendent) of CSS to the post of Under Secretary (analogous to our Deputy
Commissioner) after completion of one & half times of qualifying service
some years ago in 1999. This will not only remove the regional disparities but
also grant the opportunity to our officers to reach higher levels like their
common entry counterparts. It is also well pertinent to mention that any
officer is called stagnated, if he/she doesn’t get promotion even on completion
of 1½ times of qualifying service prescribed for promotion by DOPT.
As far as the prospective unification of Group
‘B’ Non-gazetted Executive grades into three all India cadres, viz Inspector
CE, Preventive Officers and Examiner is concerned, AIACEGEO has no objection to
it as the same being no way related to the Central Excise gazetted executive
officers. Instead of it, it is required to bring all of three categories at par in the
matter of promotion on batch to batch basis by framing the rules in the above
submitted fashion. In the meantime as a first step towards parity, the group
‘A’ entry level posts are required to be
filled-in on the basis of length of service rendered in group ‘B’ Gazetted
grade as per the IRS Rules of 1987. No group ‘A’ entry post should be shared by
the Customs till Central Excise Superintendents of 2002 enter into group ‘A’
particularly keeping in view that the Appraisers of 2002 have already entered
into group ‘A’. This is the only way to give justice to all.
