Tax India Online

7/30/2019 Tax India Online

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Cadre-Restructuring: CBDT, CBEC look for Sanity and 'Parity'from Group of Ministers

TIOL - COB( WEB) - 341APRIL 25, 2013

By Shailendra Kumar, Editor

ONLY a fortnight back, I had talked about the possibility of risingcrescendo of demand for immediate implementation of the proposedCadre Restructuring of a large basket of Group A, B & C services ofboth the Revenue Boards. With the news gradually spreading to thefield formations that it is not only the CBEC but also the CBDT, whichhas achieved the Revised Targets of revenue collections, such a newshas buoyed up the spirit and morale of the officers cutting across theGroup-hierarchy. They sincerely hope that the Finance Minister, Mr PChidambaram, may not look for more tangible reasons to justify theirdemands.

Rather they feel that their demands are nothing extra as they havealways been a loser from the perspective of the Doctrine ofParity with other organised Central or All India Services. So, the IRS

or others in sub-ordinate grades strongly feel that the DoP&T hashistorically been inimical to their interests, and since most of the keyadministrative organs, which advise the Union Cabinet, are controlledby the IAS, their service interests have been ill-treated. The feeling ofinjury to their self-respect has been so deep-seated that such asystemic discrimination or partisan behaviour is largely perceived ashostile advances to snatch away what is due to them. They also have afeeling that whatever internal rivalry or mutual distrust the IRS haswith Group B and other Services, are again fuelled by extraneousforces, which ultimately damage the interests of the Exchequer by

injecting virus of unionism.

Let's now move to some of the ground realities. As per the DoP&Tguidelines, the Cadre Review is an exercise, which is to be undertakenevery five years. And the rationale behind such an exercise is toovercome the shortcomings, which may have crept into subsequently.The cadre-restructuring is to satisfy the functional, structural and


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personnel requirements by removing distortions and enhancingefficiency and morale of the cadres. It is also to plan recruitment insuch a way to avoid future promotional blocks and prevent gap build-ups. In simple words, it aims at harmonising the functional needs withthe genuine and justified career expectations of the officers. But as thefacts go the previous Cadre Reviews were undertaken in the year 2002and 2003 for the CBDT and CBEC respectively. It clearly means aReview, which should have been undertaken after five years, has beeninitiated after 10-long years. Besides, it has been dragging its feet fortwo years and meanwhile, a good number of officers with legitimateexpectations of getting their second promotion have sorely retired butthe system does not care - least bothered is the DoP&T.

How irrelevantly our responsible Ministers speak on such sensitiveissues can be gauged from the statement of MoS V Narayanasamy,who spoke in January 2012 at Bangalore, that Within a fortnightCadre Review will be finalised with the PMOs approval. Thegovernment will safeguard your interests.He said so in the inauguralsession of the All India Convention of the Indian Revenue ServiceAssociation. Although a Minister is ultimately responsible for the failureand success of a System but he had blamed the IRS Association for nottaking the Cadre Review initiative for 10-long years. Strange it maysound! But, our politicians, who shape up a system, are generally good

at passing the buck, and time over-run, whether is an infrastructureproject or a Cadre Review, is a 'salient' feature of every decision theytake.

Anyway, let's visit the current status of the case. TIOL has come tolearn that the CBDT case, which has been running months ahead of theCBEC, was finally referred to the Committee of Secretaries after theDoP&T came up with their partisan prescription to make amendmentsin their proposal. The issue has presently been escalated to the level ofa Group of Ministers (GoM), headed by the Defence Minister. There are

about half a dozen other key Ministers in this GoM, which is slated tomeet coming Monday (April 29). The only item on its agenda is tolook into the fairness of the demand made by the CBDT and how

justified is the rejection by the DoP&T. If the GoM approves theproposal with a few alterations, it would pave the way for the CBECproposal, which has been approved by the Finance Minister recently,and it has to now snake through the Department of Expenditure and


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then to the DoP&T before it gets the 'bureaucratic nod' to get escalatedto the Cabinet-level. The only hope for its speedy clearance is thedecision of the GoM on the CBDT proposal. Whatever formula isaccepted for the CBDT, the same would apply to the CBEC, which isgearing up for the proposed GST but has not taken any new posts fornow matured Service Tax.

Let's now go to the key objections raised by the DoP&T. While tailoringthe proposals, both the Revenue Boards, which have undergonemassive transformation in terms of revenue collections responsibilities;expansion of tax-base and enhancement of taxpayers' services in thepast one decade, decided to ask for less number of posts for theirhorizontal growth and demand vertical parity with other

Services to salvage their self-respect. Although IRS is reported to bethe second most preferred Service among the Civil Services aspirantsbut ironically, it has not a SINGLE en-cadred Secretary-level post.Although in terms of size it is as big as the IAS, which has the cadrestrength of 4400 officers and about 275 Secretary-level posts, thereis NONE for the IRS. Its Chairman, the senior-most IRS officer, is atbest the ex officio Special Secretary-rank officer. What a travesty of

justice!!

When it comes to postal service or Railway Service or Audit Service,

they have their own officers reaching the top in the rank of Secretarybut for the IRS, the same system, nourished by the representatives ofParliamentary Democracy, sanctions an IAS head to rule them or putthem in a state of servitude. Even the IFS, which has a cadre strengthof 618 officers, has as many as 26 Secretary-level posts. Even the IPS,which has a strength of 3500 officers, has as many as 50 posts in theApex Scale. Even the Indian Audit and Account Service has its fairshare of Apex Scale posts but not the IRS. Why? Any constitutionalreason for such 'systemic discrimination'? None except thewhims of politicians and fancies of IAS-dominated system.

Given that our system is IAS-dominated and the fact that the IASconstitutes a Class in itself, it does not like migrants from otherServices having the same Apex Scale posts. And this is the ObjectionNumber ONE of the DoP&T.

Interestingly, the DoP&T itself had communicated to the Department ofRevenue that there should be three pay-scales for CCITs. In


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response to the same, the CBDT had proposed to remove the flaw inits structure where no posts in relation to Apex and HAG+ exist today.It also proposed to earn parity with other comparable services andsought compensation for expanded span of control, workload and

jurisdiction. It has asked for 26 Apex level posts, which wouldconstitute 0.44% of their cadre strength. For the Audit & AccountService the same ratio is 0.57%; for the IFS, it is 4.45% and forthe IAS it is 1.35%, including the field level posts. But when theCBDT has asked for 26 such posts, the great wisdom, which hasrecently dawned on DoP&T and its same Minister who had earlier saidthat the Cadre Review would be approved within a fortnight, such ademand may upset the balance in the Service and may also triggersimilar demand from other Services.

What a wonderful demonstration of administrative justice for which'rule of law' and doing away with injustice is no concern in the face ofthe possibility of similar demand from other services. Merely becauseother services may ask for their own pound of flesh, the DoP&T'svariety of doctrine of justice is to do no Justice to any service at all!!Even though the CBDT demand for Apex scale constitutes only about3% of Senior Duty Posts (SDPs), which was recommended by the Fifth

Pay Commission, it makes little sense to DoP&T, which specialises inpractising its own brand of justice-dispensing administrative ideology.DoP&T is not able to see the fact that even after it gets what it hasproposed in its cadre restructuring plan; it would stay behind the IASand others by THREE years in HAG Grade.

In a nutshell, the present dispute is more about the Apex Scale posts,which are again more about salvaging the face and self-esteem of theService, which has been doing the most crucial work of earningrevenue for the Treasury. The GoM needs to remind itself of the fact

that it is the Tax Department alone, which represents the UnionGovernment in every nook and corner of the country. It earns 'bread'for the Treasury and the Executive, which can indulge in ambitiousdevelopmental programme as per the Directive Principles enshrined inthe Constitution. Even when the economy has been under tremendousstress it has met the political targets' of revenue collections but itseems the Finance Minister and others in the Union Cabinet have scant


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respect for all such achievements. Across the world the RevenueService is treated as a premium service but India truly stands in adifferent class where logic and common sense do not make muchsense!

I fail to understand why our politicians do not see the festeringfrustration in the various Revenue Services where an Inspector ofCentral Excise barely manages just one promotion in his entire careerof 37 years. Why do they not understand that keeping a demoralisedworkforce is much more hazardous for a system than pleasing a fewdozen top-notch babus, who assist them in perpetuating theWestminster style of governance? It is high time the FinanceMinister and others in the GoM need to undo the historical

injustice inflicted on the Revenue Services of all Groups, andtheir service conditions must be brought to the level of paritywith other Services if not more.

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Sub: REPORT OF PABLIC ACCOUNTS COMMITTEE

The Public Accounts Committee in its 79th Report on the topic "Servicetax on Banking and other Financial Services" submitted to both LokSabha and Rajya Sabha on 21.03.2013 has at Para XVI of Part-B to Part-Ihas discussed in detail about the staff position in service tax under CBEC.At Para 18 of Part-II, the PAC has recommended as under ----"The Committee note that there is a lack of perspective planning in thematter of deployment of staff on such a vital source of revenue collectionviz., Service Tax.

Taking into consideration the amount of revenue collected from Service

Tax and Central Excise during the year 2011-12, the Committee aresurprised to find that in contrast to the deployment of nearly 40,000officers for excise, only 4000 to 5000 officers have been deployed forService Tax stream and that too after withdrawing from the CentralExcise stream.


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Apparently, Service Tax wing has been working for more than 15 years,with no staff of its own. The Committee are dismayed to note thehelplessness expressed both by the Finance Secretary and Chairman,

Central Board of Excise & Customs in this regard especially when,Ministry of Finance is itself one of the nodal authorities for examining andsanctioning requisite staff to Ministries. The Committee feel that the staffrequirement be examined on priority basis by the concerned authorities inorder to ensure that the Service Tax collections, which have increasedphenomenally from Rs. 407 crore in 1994-95 to Rs. 97,389 crore in 2011-12 does not suffer for want of human resource.

As per the constitution of "Committee on Public Accounts", the report ofthe Committee on a subject is presented by the Chairman to the LokSabha and Rajya Sabha. After presentation to the Lok Sabha, copies ofthe Report are forwarded to the Ministry or Department concerned whichis required to take action on the recommendations and observationscontained in the Report and furnish action taken replies thereon within sixmonths from the presentation of the Report. Action taken notes receivedfrom the Ministries/Departments are examined by the Action TakenCommittee and Action Taken Reports of the Committee are presented tothe both Houses of Parliament.

Hope an early action on the recommendations of the PAC would betaken.

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