DASS cadre employees throw weight behind Chief Minister

NEW DELHI: Amid the ongoing showdown between Chief Minister and the Chief Secretary, officials of the Delhi Administration Subordinate Services (DASS) cadre – who are appointed by the elected government – are facing a trust deficit from the side of the Lieutenant Governor and other high ranking officials.

The DASS officials asserted that they are in the support of the Chief Minister and both the LG and the Chief Secretary are allegedly intervening in their issue and distracting the government from helping the DASS cadres.

"We have always stood beside the CM and we do not trust the LG and CS because they have always ditched us. The CM had passed the restructuring of the DASS cadres in the Cabinet, but later the LG stopped it. Now, the LG house again committed us regarding the restructuring, but we know that will never happen," said a senior official.

DN Singh, president, Delhi Government Employees Welfare Association (DGEWA), said that keeping in view the acute stagnation of almost 22-25 years of grade-I DASS officers, the Cabinet Meeting on December 31, 2015, had decided to restructure the cadre on the CSS pattern and delink grade-I from DANICS.

The Delhi Assembly had, on March 26, passed a resolution to implement the Cabinet order. "This decision has neither been rejected by the LG, nor has it been kept reserved for consideration by the President of India. The restructuring of DASS cadre is a subject matter of the state government, following the SC's decision. We condemn the decision. Our association will pursue the matter with the elected government," Singh said.

Recently, Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal had assured the DASS cadre that he would meet their demand for cadre restructuring when the subject of services was returned to the elected government.

"You are a part of our family. Because of political reasons, the powers of the elected government were snatched, which is why we have not been able to do what we wanted," he said.