Stalin, Vijayan oppose Centre's move to tweak IAS Cadre Rules

Chennai/ Thiruvananthapuram: Amendments to the IAS Cadre Rules proposed by the Centre, 'strikes at the very root' of the nation's federal polity and state autonomy, Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M K Stalin told Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Sunday and urged him to drop the move.

Expressing deep concern about the draft amendments proposed by Union government, Stalin strongly objected to it. The amendment proposal, "strikes at the very root of our federal polity and state autonomy." If implemented, the proposed amendments would cause irreparable damage to the spirit of cooperative federalism that exist between Union and the states and lead to concentration of powers in the Union government, Stalin said in a letter to Modi.

"I would also like to highlight the fact that many of the state governments are also woefully short of officers at specific seniorities, primarily due to the wrong cadre management policies followed by the Union government," he said.

While the Union is availing the common pool from Group-I officers at the national level, the state governments solely depend on the limited pool of IAS officers available in the State. The state governments are on the forefront of implementation of various programmes including the schemes of the Union government at the state level, he said.

The states also face frequent natural disasters which demands services of IAS officers in the state more than elsewhere. Under such circumstances, forcing the state governments to depute officers would surely aggravate the 'governance deficit' in various states due to shortage of officers and also it is an 'affront' to the administrative frame work of the states, Stalin said.

"Further, I wish to state that the Union government's lateral entry recruitment has also affected the morale of the officers who seek deputation on their own willingness. I would like to point out that this new proposal will eventually destroy the uniqueness of All India Services, a basic feature of Indian Constitution," the CM said.

Echoing similar views, Kerala urged the Centre to drop the move to bring amendments to IAS (Cadre) deputation rules, saying it will create "fear psychosis" among civil service officials to implement the state government policies.

In a letter to Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan said the present deputation rules are themselves heavily loaded in favour of the Union and bringing in further stringency will weaken the very root of cooperative federalism.

"The proposed amendments in the Deputation Rules of All India Services will definitely induce a fear psychosis and an attitude of hesitancy among All India Service Officers to implement policies of a state government, which are formed by party/parties politically opposed by the ruling party at the Centre", Vijayan said in the letter. He said the Kerala government is of the opinion that "these proposed amendments" may be dropped.

"In our federal set-up, the state governments are on a par with the central government as both of them are elected by the people, though the division of authority in the Constitution does give the Union jurisdiction over a wider range of subjects," the letter said.

"We need to recognise that in a vibrant democratic and federal polity, States and the Centre can be ruled by political formations with vastly different ideologies and political views. But these governments function within the framework of the Constitution", it said.

The Union government has proposed an amendment to the IAS (Cadre) Rules, 1954, which would enable it to post IAS officers on central deputation, bypassing reservations of state governments.