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Chandigarh MC holds back salary of 16% office employees for not marking biometric attendance
MC commissioner said that salary disbursal will now be subject to the reasons offered by staffers for not adhering to rules
The Chandigarh municipal corporation has held back the salary of 300 employees for the month of February as they did not mark their biometric attendance.
Municipal commissioner KK Yadav, who had made biometric attendance mandatory last November, said that out of 1,800 MC office employees, nearly 300 were found not paying heed to the order.
“We have sought a valid reason from them for not adhering to these executive orders,” he said, adding that salary disbursal will now be subject to the reasons offered by the staffers.
Biometric attendance system comprises smart devices that record the in and out timings of employees using their fingerprints. It prevents proxy attendance and helps keep track of the employees.
Yadav said it is imperative for all employees to comply with biometric attendance or they will be marked absent.
“When most government offices in the UT have turned to biometric attendance, there is no reason for MC employees to continue to avoid it,” he said.
More GPS watches for field staff
Despite opposition from sweepers’ association, the MC has decided to buy 2,000 more global positioning system (GPS) enabled wrist watches to monitor its field staff.
Yadav said of the 6,000 field employees, 4,000 will get watches within 10 days, and the remaining in a phased manner.
The sweepers’ association had submitted a memorandum last week, warning of going on a protest from February 27 if the decision was not rolled back. They claimed that workers were feeling nausea and dizziness after wearing these gadgets.
However, the MC chief clarified that there was no health issue linked to these gadgets.
Yadav said the project, meant to increase efficiency of field employees, will be fully launched on April 1. “We often get complaints that MC sweepers, gardeners, sanitation inspectors and enforcement staff are absent from field duty. This new system will rein them in,” he said.
