NEW DELHI, Feb 21: The Union Home Ministry has asked all the States to nominate adequate number of Indian Police Service (IPS) officers for Central deputation.
The Ministry expressed concern that the State governments were either withdrawing the names of selected officers or were not relieving them for taking up an assignment with the Central government resulting in considerable delay in the placement of the officers at the Centre and adversely impacted the entire process of “selection, deputation and cadre management.”
The Ministry cautioned that officers who are selected but fail to join within a month would be debarred from Central deputation for five years. “If any officer, on being selected, does not join within one month of issue of his/her appointment order, either on account of personal disinclination or on refusal by the concerned State Government to relieve the officer,” he or she would be debarred for five years, the Ministry said. The debar policy is in existence for decades.
As of now, there are 220 vacancies for IPS officers from the rank of Superintendent of Police (SP) to Director-General of Police in 17 Central organisations such as the Central Bureau of Investigation, the Central Armed Police Forces and the Intelligence Bureau.
IPS officers are recruited by the Union Public Service Commission (UPSC) on behalf of the Centre and their services are placed under various State cadres. As per norms, at least 40% of senior duty posts in each State cadre are earmarked as Central Deputation Reserve (CDR) posts. The concurrence of officers is also required for Central deputation.
“The CDR of each IPS cadre determines the extent to which the number of officers could be sent on deputation to Government of India. However, it has been the experience that the offer list of some States do not contain sufficient number of names vis-a-vis CDR utilization. Hence, States need to sponsor adequate number of officers so that posts reserved for IPS officers in Central Armed Police Forces (CAPFs)/Central Police Organizations (CPOs) are manned by them,” the Ministry said.
The Home Ministry said it was observed that even though a few IPS officers had submitted their applications/nominations on the online portal for approval of the competent authority, the same were not being processed or forwarded by the cadre controlling authority or the State governments. It said a conscious attempt should be made by the State governments to forward the names of officers for deputation under the Government of India so that “every eligible officer gets an opportunity to serve at the Centre at least once at the middle level and again at the senior level.”
In February 2022, the Home Ministry amended the IPS tenure policy doing away with the mandatory requirement of empanelment of IPS officers at the Deputy Inspector-General (DIG) level. It said “officers with minimum 14 years of experience will be eligible for appointment at the level of DIG by the Centre.”
Officers are assessed on whether they are suitable for Central deputation by the Central Police Establishment Board (CPEB) headed by the Union Home Secretary. The names of officers up to the rank of Inspector-General of Police are then sent to the Appointments Committee of the Cabinet (ACC), headed by the Prime Minister, for approval.
(Manas Dasgupta)