UP govt plans outsourcing corporation to hire and manage contractual employees

“We have finalised the draft for the formation of a corporation and have sent it to concerned departments for consultation. While it has got in-principle approval from Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath, it will be soon placed before the Cabinet for approval after legal vetting,” said a senior official in the State General Administration Department, which will be the nodal department for the corporation.

Once in place, the corporation would ensure checks on cases of fraud, exploitation as well as “ghost employees” working through a contract in 93 departments and corporations across the state, the official added.

As the Opposition parties’ have been constantly targeting the BJP government for allegedly not fulfilling the reservation criteria in the appointment of contractual employees, officials said the Corporation would ensure reservation for SCs, STs as well as OBCs in the appointment of contractual employees in the state.

“Once the Corporation is in place, there would be a centralised monitoring system. The departments would list their requirement needs to the corporation, which will advertise and hire people. The appointments will be linked with the provident fund department as their salaries would be directly transferred to their accounts and proper reservation will be ensured,” said a senior officer, adding it would also save time and funds of the departments, which throughout the year are engaged in tendering and appointment process.

With complaints of exploitation by hiring agencies — contractual employees either not being paid their provident fund despite getting reimbursements from the government, or women staff members not being paid during their maternity leave — the Corporation would ensure that such discrepancies don’t take place, said an official.

“The Corporation will also ensure not just decent wages, which will be above the minimum wages, to the contractual employees but also bring uniformity in wages for similar work. For example, the wages of contractual safai karamcharis working across all the civic bodies in the state would be uniform,” said the official.

During the recent Budget Session, Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath told the Assembly that the minimum wage for the contractual employees will be from Rs 16,000 to Rs 20,000 per month.

On whether the setting up of a Corporation for contractual workers would lead to job cuts, the official said: “The change will be gradual and existing workers will not be removed. The fresh hiring process will start through the Corporation once completion of the existing terms of the tender. Moreover, as the appointments will be done through the Corporation, thus changing the agencies would not mean employees losing their jobs. Instead, there will be renewal of contracts, which will be listed at the time of advertising the vacancy,” the officer said.