Decks cleared for appointing RSS man as director

Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, January 19

Decks have been cleared for installation of an RSS man as Mission Director of the Haryana Skill Development Mission.

In its meeting held here today, the Governing Council of the Mission headed by Chief Secretary DS Dhesi, who is also its president, ratified Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar’s orders issued some time back to outsource the post which is otherwise reserved for an IAS officer.

The Governing Council also ratified the Cabinet’s January 3 decision to transfer the Haryana Skill Development Mission from the Technical Education Department to the Industrial Training Department.

The Governing Council has also decided that the Administrative Secretary and the Director of the Industrial Training Department will henceforth be the vice-president and the Member Secretary, respectively of the mission instead those of the Technical Education Department as provided in the mission’s constitution.

“This government has been flouting rules and norms with impunity when it comes to adjusting people with saffron background to public posts,” alleged Congress MLA Karan Dalal.

The Tribune had reported in a news item ‘If saffron’s the flavour, rule book’s the casualty’ published in these columns on December 5 that the BJP government in Haryana was preparing to install an RSS man as Mission Director of the Haryana Skill Development Mission, a post reserved for an IAS office.

The state government, in fact, had even advertised the post in August this year for filling it through outsourcing despite strong reservations by the Technical Education Department, but sources said the man who had been ‘handpicked’ for the post was later appointed as Vice-Chancellor of a newly set up state university.

A perusal of the official documents in this regards (a copy is with The Tribune) reveal that the Technical Education Department was of the view that “Appointing a non-IAS officer has not been envisaged in the rules and regulations of the society. It would have adverse financial and administrative implications for the Haryana Skill Development.”

However, the department’s view was ignored. The government, later, initiated a move to shift the Haryana Skill Development Mission from the Technical Education Department to the Industrial Training Department and today, its Governing Council has officially ratified the government’s decision to outsource the post.