Govt employees to work in shifts

Employees of the Maharashtra government have started working in two shifts to reduce footfall in the Mantralaya as part of the state’s efforts to curb the spread of the Covid-19 pandemic

Mumbai: Employees of the Maharashtra government have started working in two shifts to reduce footfall in the Mantralaya as part of the state’s efforts to curb the spread of the Covid-19 pandemic. The state legislature has started staggering the hours of its 820 employees between two shifts, from 9 to 3pm and from 1 to 7pm.

The state legislature has started staggering the hours of its 820 employees between two shifts, from 9 to 3pm and from 1 to 7pm (Bhushan Koyande)

The General Administration Department (GAD) issued an order on Monday to stagger office hours to two shifts — from 9.45am to 5.45pm and from 10.15 am to 6.15 pm shift — and asked heads of departments to issue further orders on which shift their employees will be part of. More than 5,500 personnel work in various departments in the Mantralaya.

Indra Malo, secretary, GAD said that the government departments were free to change the timing as per their requirement. “The GAD order is an advisory to other departments, which are free to make changes to reduce the attendance. Some of the departments have started doing it, while some have asked the employees to come to the office on alternate days. The order is open to the suggestions and changes in the future if the need be. We are minutely following the norms and Covid-19 appropriate behaviour,” she said.

On January 8, the state government imposed curbs, including a night curfew, to prevent the spread of the pandemic.

“The head of the department should ensure rationalising of the employees by promoting work from home and staggering working hours depending upon the requirement of the employees. The heads should consider the flexible working hours,” the GAD order stated.

Rajendra Bhagwat, secretary, state legislature, said that the staggering of the office timing has been done to reduce attendance in the offices without hampering the office work.

“We have also reduced the shift to 6 hours to ensure that the employees are not burden during the pandemic time. Instead of the calling them to work on alternate day we have reduce the shift duration. The order will be in place for next two weeks after which a review meeting will be held to take a call on its extension. The decision over the choice of the shift has to be taken at the department level amicably,” he said.

Ends