Chandigarh: In a big relief to a section of senior IPS officers in Haryana who were on the financially disadvantaged side in terms of perks, the home department has proposed to backdate their promotion benefits with effect from January 1 of the promotion year. The state government will have to take a final call on the proposal.
The move will benefit those IPS officers who have been allegedly denied the benefits for years due to the existing yardsticks for promotions in the state.
In Haryana several IPS officers got promotion benefits with effect from January 1 of the year of the promotion irrespective of the actual date of promotion. On the other hand, many other officers got the benefits only from the actual date of promotion. This discriminatory approach has been causing a heartburn among the affected IPS officers, sources said.
The latest move is aimed at bringing all IPS officers on the same plank in terms of promotional benefits.
An IGP rank officer Y Puran Kumar has been taking up this issue with the state government for the past two years. A few days ago, the officials of the state home department proposed to get verified the availability of promotional posts in the various ranks as on January 1 of the respective year.
“…if the posts in the promotional ranks are available, the promotions can be given with effect 1 January of the respective year with notional benefits to all the officers. In case, on verification, the posts are not found available, the promotions shall remain effective from the dates as mentioned in promotion orders,” the home department officials have suggested to their seniors for a call by the government.
The 2001-batch IPS officer, Kumar is currently the Inspector General of Police (IGP) (Telecommunications). He was promoted to the post of DIG on October 12, 2015 “with immediate affect”. However, he has been seeking his promotion to the post of DIG with “retrospective effect”; ie from January 1, 2015. He also urged the government to refix pay scales and arrears from January 1, 2015 to till date be released with interest as applicable.
Kumar urged the government that promotion of 2001 batch IPS officers to the rank of DIG may be considered on merits and considered to be revised to be effective from January 1, 2015, based on Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) guidelines and similar orders of promotion for DIG rank officers of 2006 and 2007 batches.
He alleged that the MHA guidelines were applied in such a manner that while select few officers and batches have been getting “undue” financial advantage while other officers and batchers are at a financial loss.
For instance, “the promotions for 1993, 1994 and 1995 batch officers were done with immediate effect and the promotion of 1996 batch officers were made from backdate (January 1 of the respective year). Giving an example of his promotion, Kumar mentioned that his promotion to the rank of DIG took place on October 12, 2015 “with immediate effect”, whereas “the due date for the same promotion was January 1, 2015”. According to the officer, due to this order he got the July 2015 increment on the old scale as the pay scale for the rank of DIG was granted effectively only from October 2015.
Recently, the officials of the state home department have examined his representation. They noted that the revised pay scale after his promotion was effective from the date — October 2015 whereas 2006 and 2007 batch IPS officers have been promoted to the rank of DIG from back date — that is effective from January 1 of the year of their promotions.
The officials of the home department also underlined that “this selective interpretation of MHA guidelines for certain batches like the 2001 batch has caused, and will be causing long-term financial losses to the officers”.
According to sources, the issue of promotions was also raised during a meeting chaired by Haryana Home Minister Anil Vij on November 7, 2023. Then, the minister was also informed of how a top IPS officer succeeded in getting his date of promotion changed to January 1 (2015) after submitting a representation to the government, the sources said.
