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Graft on rise as GHMC suffers staff crunch
If seems that everything is not spic and span in the Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation (GHMC). According to highly placed sourced, many wings in the corporation are actually functioning with just about 50 percent of the required staff.
Hyderabad: If seems that everything is not spic and span in the Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation (GHMC). According to highly placed sourced, many wings in the corporation are actually functioning with just about 50 percent of the required staff.
Given the freeze in recruitment since the early eighties and the fact that scores of senior officials are set to retire in about a year, things are only going to worsen, warn officials.
Ironically, staff crunch in all wings is blamed for the stinking levels of corruption in the GHMC. There is leakage of thousands of crores of rupees annually in the form high-level graft.
The corporation officials claim that it has become a herculean task for the existing staff to operate transparently and maintain the civic body.
Highly placed sources in the GHMC said that the corporation had only one IAS officer, against the requirement of five officers. Incidentally, the others have since been deputed as district collectors, following the reorganisation of districts.
The officials pointed out that even the erstwhile Municipal Corporation of Hyderabad (MCH) had five IAS officers. No wonder, it has become very difficult to operate the GHMC with just one IAS officer as Commissioner. Officials also said that only 3,000 members of staff were working in the corporation, against the requirement of 5,200.
A senior GHMC official told The Hans India that the previous recruitment for the Deputy Commissioner level officers had taken place in 1983 during the tenure of former chief minister N Taraka Rama Rao.
Since then there has been no recruitment. Of course, the authorities have been promoting Assistant Municipal Commissioners (AMCs) as Deputy Commissioners, even though they are not eligible for the post.
Interestingly, about 40 senior officials from all GHMC wings would retire next year. Officials rued that this would stretch the overburdened system further and the citizens would face serious troubles. The emerging precarious situation would multiply graft and deepen crisis in the corporation, officials reasoned.
The officials said the corporation required immediately at least 2,000 additional members of staff -- from attenders to IAS officers, to bridge the gaps in the system and, more importantly, to curb irregularities in the corporation.
With the increase in the number of circles from 24 to 30, things would get complicated further. It would become much more difficult for the corporation staff to function and citizens would have to bear the brunt of acute staff shortage coupled with unchecked graft.
