Friday, Apr 16, 2021 08:15 [IST]
Last Update: Friday, Apr 16, 2021 02:37 [IST]
GANGTOK,: A Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) has been enforced from Thursday to ensure punctuality in government offices by the State government.
“We are enforcing the SOP from today itself. The SOP clearly defines how and what needs to be followed and implemented at the same time,” said chief secretary S.C. Gupta to SIKKIM EXPRESS.
Government office timings are from 10 am to 4:30 pm on a working day.
As directed by Chief Minister P.S. Golay, all employees and officials need to be punctual while reporting for duty at 10 am though a grace time of 15 minutes would be allowed. After that, action should be taken against those coming late or not found on duty during office hours, he had directed.
The chief secretary shared that some norms were relaxed in 2020 during the peak Covid pandemic period but the situation now is different. It is seen that officials and employees are not present at offices even after 10:30 am which is not desirable and must be corrected, he said. We are now determined to correct the office working situation while also fighting the Covid situation, he said.
“If the officers and employees are not present on duty on the scheduled time, they will be marked absent and ‘Leave without pay’. This is not applicable for those officials and employees who have sanctioned tour programme or leave,” said Gupta.
The chief secretary informed that the government also plans to have surprise inspections in government offices. The inspection teams would have senior officials of other departments who will visit the particular department in the morning and afternoon hours to check the attendance of the employees and officials, he said.
All the employees should realize that they are for public service and they have to be punctual and also attentive to the needs of the people, said the chief secretary.
“We want public work is delivered in a timely manner. It is not acceptable to have the public run from pillar to post and visit many times for the same work. We also plan to bring a mechanism soon which will ensure that officials and employees deliver the public work in a time bound manner,” said the chief secretary.
