After Uttar Pradesh government gave 'forced retirement' to over two dozen government officers, Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath has constituted a committee to screen 'corrupt' and 'inefficient' IAS officers who are above 50 years of age.

The committee will be headed by the Chief Secretary Rajive Kumar. Senior IAS officers Anu Badhawan, Suresh Chandra, Deepak Trivedi and Praveer Kumar will be its members. The Committee will screen corrupt and inefficient IAS officers on the basis of their ACRs (Annual Charatcter Rolls).

It may be recalled that after assuming power, the Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath had announced to forcibly retire government officers and employees who are corrupt, inefficient and not keeping pace with the work assigned.

The Chief Minister had stated that such employees and officers will be given the option to take VRS or salary of three months or face legal action.

The Chief Secretary Rajive Kumar said that the committee will screen ACRs of above 50 IAS officers and submit a report within a month. The confidential report will be submitted to the state government for action.

Uttar Pradesh is the largest and one of the most prestigious cadre of civil servants in the country. Currently, about 621 IAS officers are posted in the state. In 1997, the UP IAS Association had created flutter in the cadre when it had selected three most corrupt IAS officers through a secret ballot during their annual general meeting (AGM).

The Association had submitted the names of the three most corrupt IAS officers to then Kalyan Singh government which had, however, refused recommend any action against them to the Department of Personnel and Training (DoPT) questioning its selection process.

IAS officers are up in arms against the Yogi government’s move to force retirement of their colleagues above 50 on the basis of screening of their ACRs. “ACRs can be prejudiced if your senior is not happy with you. How can that be formed the basis for initiating any action against any officers of the UP cadre,” pointed a former Secretary of the UP IAS Association.

“We are governed by services rules framed by the DoPT. How can state government decide on our service matters. We are not against action against corrupt ones but then charges against them have to be proved legally,” said another senior IAS officer, not wishing to be quoted.

IAS officers are likely to raise the issue during their four-day AGM, beginning December 14. “We will certainly take up the issue during the AGM to lodge our protest against any such move,” claimed the senior officer.