The Prime Minister's Office (PMO) is among 30 odd central departments which have failed to comply with a government's directive to put in place measures to check arbitrariness in use of discretionary powers enjoyed by their ministers. The Department of Personnel and Training (DoPT), which acts as a nodal department to coordinate with central ministries, on Thursday issued a reminder to over 30 departments asking them to give details of such measures along with reasons for not complying with its directives issued over a year ago.
The Centre on April 16, 2012 had issued a circular to all ministries under it to carry out an exercise for putting in place regulating parameters for exercise of discretionary powers and put them in public domain so as to minimise arbitrariness in exercise of such powers. In its another circular issued in May, 2012, the DoPT had asked the central government departments to send a copy of such guidelines in case they already existed. In case of absence of these measures, the DoPT had given them three months time to form the guidelines.
A reminder dated April 1, 2013 was also issued in this regard. "However, no reply/information have been received...It is requested to kindly expedite the requisite information to this department urgently," the DoPT said in its office memorandum issued today to all the defaulting departments.
There are more than 50 central government departments, out of which 18, including the Department of Space, Ministry of New ~~amp; Renewable Energy, Department of Information Technology (Ministry of Communications ~~amp; IT), Ministry of Labour ~~amp; Employment and Ministry of Steel have responded to the central government's directive.
Ministry of Health ~~amp; Family Welfare, Department of Rural Development, Department of Agriculture Research ~~amp; Education, Ministry of Power, Ministry of Health ~~amp; Family Welfare (Department of Health Research), Department of Atomic Energy and Department of Revenue have also complied with the directive. The compliance was also ensured by Ministry of Home Affairs (Rajbhasa wing), Central Information Commission, Department of AYUSH (Ministry of Health ~~amp; Family Welfare), Department of Telecommunications, Department of Financial Services and Ministry of Development of North Eastern Region.
The DoPT's directive had come on a recommendation by a Group of Ministers to tackle corruption after examining the proposal related to "relinquishing discretionary powers enjoyed by ministers at the Centre". The GoM, which was formed on January 6, 2011, was mandated to advise the government on matters including state funding of elections, fast tracking of all cases of public servants accused of corruption, ensuring full transparency in public procurement and contracts and introduction of an open and competitive system of exploiting natural resources.
The government has already done away with discretionary allotment of gas pumps and issue of gas coupons besides discretionary funds at the hands of some ministries like Social Welfare among others.
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