Dehradun: A cabinet meeting was held on Saturday under the chairmanship of Chief Minister Pushkar Singh Dhami. In this meeting, the proposal to regularize all ad hoc and contract employees of the state has been approved. Due to the cut off date of regularization not being final, instructions have been given to bring the proposal of this regularization of the Personnel Department in the upcoming cabinet meeting.
During the Dhami cabinet meeting, there was a detailed discussion on the regularization of ad hoc and contract employees. Also, the cabinet agreed that all those ad hoc and contract employees who have completed 10 years of work will be regularized. According to information received from sources, during the meeting, there was a detailed discussion on keeping the year 2018 or the year 2024 as the cut off date. Due to the lack of final consensus on the cut off date, instructions have been given to the Personnel Department to bring this proposal in the next cabinet.
There are about 15 thousand ad-hoc and contract employees in the government departments, corporations and councils of Uttarakhand. All of them have been demanding regularization for a long time. In 2013, the then Chief Minister Vijay Bahuguna had prepared rules for the regularization of ad-hoc and contract employees working in government departments, corporations and autonomous institutions. In which it was provided that the employees who could not be regulated under the rules made in the year 2011 will be regulated.
After the formation of Uttarakhand state in the year 2000, many departments kept being formed. Due to which the employees posted in them could not get the benefit of the rules of the year 2011. In such a situation, in the year 2016, the then Harish government issued a revised regularization rule. In which the service tenure of 10 years was reduced to 5 years. Due to which the High Court put a stay on all these appointments. Also, the High Court, while declaring the regularization rules of the year 2013 as correct, had said that arrangements should be made to regulate the ad-hoc and contract employees who have been providing their services for the last 10 years.
On the basis of these instructions of the court, the SMS Personnel Department prepared a revised rule on the lines of the regularization rules of the year 2013. On which, during the meeting of the Dhami cabinet held on March 15, 2024 this year, the proposal regarding regularization of ad-hoc and contract employees was approved, but due to some technical personnel, this arrangement could not be implemented during that time. In such a situation, the Dhami cabinet held on 17 August 2024 has once again agreed to it. Due to the situation not being clear on the cut-off date, instructions have been given to bring this proposal in the upcoming cabinet meeting.
