New Delhi: The Union government may nudge its departments and public sector firms to fill up backlog reserved vacancies for Scheduled Castes (SCs) at the earliest even as finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman has directed public sector banks to fill vacant positions reserved for SCs by December 31 and intimate the same to the National Commission for Scheduled Castes, two officials with direct knowledge of the matter said.
While public sector banks (PSBs) are expected to launch the recruitment drive from October 2, the government, through its various ministries, will push its agencies and public sector undertakings (PSUs) to fill vacancies expeditiously, they said requesting anonymity.
Citing minister of state for personnel Jitendra Singh’s reply in Lok Sabha on July 20, 2022, they said the 10 ministries and departments with more than 90% of the central government employees had a backlog of 18,132 reserved vacancies as on January 1, 2021. They are defence, railways, financial services, posts, home affairs, atomic energy, revenue, education, defence production, and housing & urban affairs.
National Commission for Scheduled Castes (NCSC) chairman Vijay Sampla on Thursday said during a review of PSBs’ performance earlier this week, the finance minister gave specific deadlines to CMDs of banks for inclusive credit disbursal and filling up vacant posts reserved for SCs.
“All banks [PSBs] will begin a special campaign drive on October 2 for filling up of the backlog vacancies of Scheduled Castes. This exercise is to be completed by December 31, 2022,” he said. The review was undertaken in his presence and the finance minister has directed public sector banks and the department of financial services (DFS) to intimate the progress to NCSC.
One of the officials mentioned above said the vacancies, including promotions related to SCs in state-run banks, could be around 7-8% of 18,132 posts to be filled. “But, this initiative of FM and the NCSC Chairman will set a trend and be an example for other departments. If India is to become a developed nation by 2047, it cannot ignore the upliftment of about 20-25 crore population,” he said.
Speaking to reporters on Thursday, Sampla said the government’s focus is also on the financial empowerment of the SCs. Many of them can become entrepreneurs and start providing jobs to people rather than seeking jobs with the right credit support and hand-holding by banks.
According to a finance ministry statement issued after Tuesday’s review meeting, Sitharaman asked banks to fill the small number of remaining backlog vacancies in a time-bound manner, and provide forward and backward linkages through the convergence of various schemes meant for SCs while giving them financial assistance. She directed heads of banks to look into the requirements of capacity building and entrepreneurship development as SCs constitute about 18% of the total workforce of the banks and financial institutions.
Banks have also been directed “to make proper digital records for jobs being outsourced, especially for posts like Safai Karamcharis” from October 1, it said. DFS has been directed to launch a special drive to redress all pending grievances pertaining to the SC community from October 2.
The finance minister also directed PSBs to apprise the NCSC twice every year — first through an interaction anytime from April 14 (the birthday of Babasaheb Ambedkar) to April 30, and second by sharing information in October — regarding the progress made in recruitment and credit to Scheduled Castes.
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