Kumari Palany & Co

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1000 retired VAOs to be appointed by the government of TN

Posted on: 20/Jun/2019 10:28:47 AM
The latest news is 1000 retired village administrative officers or VAOs would be appointed by the state government for the posts lying vacant in the TN state. It is now said that this would be first time this would take place in TN and it has caught the attention of many.

These retired officials would be paid a consolidated amount of Rs 15000 per month and the revenue administration had instructed the district collectors to appoint the retired officials on a temporary basis. It should be taken into account that VAOs, the heads of revenue administration of 1 to 3 villages are given powers to collect tax, certify for government welfare schemes, maintain law and order. They have also got powers to extend assistance to the farmers from crop insurance to assessment.

Information collected is the sanctioned strength of VAOs for the entire state of TN is 12616 and now atleast 2896 posts have become vacant. The point is the government decided to fill these posts after a recommendation from the commissionerate of revenue administration. It must be noted that the retired VAOs were well experienced and have considerable knowledge on the duties and responsibilities. Hence they were considered appropriate for these vacant posts.

Revenue minister, Mr. R.B. Udayakumar, expressed his thoughts and spoke about how district collectors have the power to make appointments keeping in mind recruitments by TNPSC, appointments on compassionate grounds or promotion of village assistants to the posts of VAOs.

He added that the retired officials would get salaries for a time of 1 year or until the necessity ceases. He cited reasons for the vacancies and said vacancies were created due to superannuation or due to highly qualified personnel shifting to other jobs. By this, the serving VAOs were burdened with heavy workloads and theses VAOs were accused of not making their presence felt in the village.

The minister finally threw light on how these vacancies were informed periodically to the public service commission but and how the recruitment agency had delayed holding the exams.

Important information is earlier the government thought of having one recruitment board for the revenue service just similar to the TRB and medical services recruitment board. The idea was dropped later. There were strong criticisms from the servicing officers regarding the appointment of retired VAOs and representations have been sent to the government.

According to Mr. Suresh, president of TN Village Adminsitrative Officers Munnetra Sangam expressed his thoughts regarding the government appointing retired VAOs. He spoke about how inspite of government justifying its move to appoint retired personnel it was condemnable. He compared this current situation with that of 2008 where there were more than 5000 vacancies and said the serving officers managed it well at that time.