Salaries of UT staff to be linked with Aadhaar-based attendance system

Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, November 21

Six months after introducing the Aadhaar-based attendance managements system for its employees, the Chandigarh Administration has decided to link the salary of the employees based on their attendance record.

The new system is being introduced in the office of the Deputy Commissioner and the UT Estate Office from January 1, 2016. “The practice will be followed in other departments of the UT. It will bring new accountability and transparency in the functioning of government offices as the working hours of the employees will be on record”, said a senior UT official.

Not only the employees, all senior officials like Deputy Commissioner, Additional Deputy Commissioner and Sub Divisional Magistrates, whose offices are in the DC Office Complex, have to mark their attendance.

During the last six months, over 500 such devices are being installed in the UT offices. Based on the Aadhaar system, that is GPRS and Wi-Fi enabled, the new system logs the entry and exit time of the employees and tracks chronic late comers. Around 5,500 employees will be covered under the project.

UT DC Ajit Balaji Joshi said apart from the attendance-based salary, it had been made mandatory for all employees and officials to carry their identity cards. “All the employees have been asked to get their I-cards made by December 15. This will help in checking the entry of unauthorised persons in the Estate Office”, he said.

The Aadhaar-based smart device authenticates an employee’s identity on the basis of the picture taken and matches it with the unique identity number of the employee. If any employee of the Estate Office has gone to the UT Secretariat on duty, he can mark his attendance there. It will automatically get stored in the central data.