Now, biometric attendance for Panchayat Dept field staff

Vishav Bharti

Advertisement

Chandigarh, February 9

To check absenteeism among field staff, Minister for Rural Development and Panchayats Kuldeep Dhaliwal today gave orders to start biometric attendance system for all employees, including doctors.

The orders issued by the minister stated: “It has been observed that a large number of employees among the field staff are not present in their office due to which public has to go through tough times.” So, he ordered that the biometric attendance system must be introduced in all field offices of the department by the end of this month.

He instructed officials that from March 1 onwards, each and every employee would mark his/her attendance on the machine, which would be connected to the head office.

Dhaliwal said all officials, including doctors, who work as Rural Medical Officers, would mark their attendance on the biometric machine.

Sources revealed that the decision has been taken after it was brought to the notice of minister that a new type of racket has been going on for several years in the department under which senior officials charge monthly bribe from employees to ‘take the job easy’.

At several places, there were complaints against Rural Medical Officers that they don’t attend their dispensaries regularly.

Significantly, some other departments, including education, has already introduced biometric attendance system a few years back.

But the same was discontinued during the Covid pandemic outbreak. Some head offices in Chandigarh have already resumed the biometric attendance system.