Sources said instructions have come from the Prime Minister’s Office to prepare a broad outline of modalities for selecting private individuals for appointment in the ranks of deputy secretary, director and joint secretary. Sources said instructions have come from the Prime Minister’s Office to prepare a broad outline of modalities for selecting private individuals for appointment in the ranks of deputy secretary, director and joint secretary.

With a Committee of Secretaries favouring lateral entry into the civil service, the Department of Personnel & Training (DoPT) has been instructed to put up a proposal on the induction of outsiders in the middle rung of ministries that deal with economy and infrastructure.

Sources said instructions have come from the Prime Minister’s Office to prepare a broad outline of modalities for selecting private individuals for appointment in the ranks of deputy secretary, director and joint secretary. The move was in response to a central government staffing policy paper where the DoPT had indicated a huge shortage of officers in the middle management level, they said.

Sources said the shortlisting of private sector executives or social workers would be through a matrix of experience and qualification, without taking into account their existing salaries. The final selection would be done by a committee headed by the Cabinet Secretary, they said.

The preliminary estimate was that around 40 individuals, including successful entrepreneurs, academicians and social workers, would be taken in through lateral entry, mainly at the joint-secretary level where there is a dearth of officers.

According to another official, these appointments would not be for regulating ministries such as Home, Defence, Personnel or even Corporate Affairs. Last August, Minister of State for Personnel Jitendra Singh had told Lok Sabha that there was no proposal to constitute a committee to study the feasibility of lateral entry as such issues required political consensus.

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