30 per cent of civic works are now outsourced to ensure that the vacancies do not disrupt the civic administration
Chennai corporation are facing a shortage of staff over the last three years ever since the city was expanded
Chennai: Footfalls at the secretariat and the public health and forest departments have been increasing over the past few weeks, thanks to the recent notifications by government announcing recruitment to fill the existing vacancies after a period of one year.However, there are no signs of recruitment with the Chennai corporation and the Chennai metro water facing a shortage of staff over the last three years ever since the city was expanded. While the civic body has been recruiting staff on compassionate grounds, insiders admit that more than 30 per cent of civic works are now outsourced to ensure that the vacancies do not disrupt the civic administration.
“Chennai corporation needs at least 10,000 sanitary workers and 500 staff at the executive levels for its routine work like cleaning, tax collection, monitoring of restaurants, lodges, burial grounds and hospitals,” said S. Purushothaman, secretary, Chennai Managaratchi Anaithu Uzhiyar Sangham.“There are no proposals pending as of now, regarding mass recruitment, but hiring on compassionate grounds is done on a periodical basis. Even on Monday, mayor Saidai Duraisamy handed over job offers to a few new appointees,” a civic official said.
The situation is worse with metro water. “We need at least 4,000 group ‘D’ workers for clearing sewer blocks and to handle water supply complaints,” admitted an engineer. After expansion of the city, now every ward has 150-200 streets with close to 20 complaints daily, but staff strength is inadequate, he added. When local administration minister S.P. Velumani was asked about the status of existing vacancies he said that he was not sure about the facts related to vacancies. When asked whether government has any proposal to fill vacancies, the minister evaded reply.
However things are looking positive for departments like health and family welfare, environment and forests, school education and transport. These departments have begun paper work to fill vacant posts. Last week, the health department notified vacancies and has started inviting applications to fill 1727 assistant surgeons’ posts.
Forest minister M.S. M. Anandan who conducted a review meeting on Monday directed officials to speed up the recruitment of field staff. “For the first time, the forest department will also recruit more women rangers shortly,” a senior forest department official said.
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