12/01/2016 

Central Civil Services (Leave Travel concession) Rules, 1988 – Fulfillment of Procedural requirements

No.31011/3/2015-Estt (A.IV)
Government of India
Ministry of Personnel, Public Grievances and Pensions
Department of Personnel and Training
Establishment A-IV Desk

North Block, New Delhi-110 001
Dated: January 11, 2016

OFFICE MEMORANDUM

Subject:- Central Civil Services (Leave Travel concession) Rules, 1988 – Fulfillment of Procedural requirements.

This Department is in receipt of a number of references regarding the procedural difficulties faced by the Government employees in application and settlement of the LTC claims. Sometimes, the Government servants claim that failure to follow the correct procedure was on account of a lack of knowledge of the rules/instructions while in the other cases the delay is caused in the late processing of LTC claims.

2. To remove these bottlenecks, this Department has decided to simplify the procedure of application and make the procedure of processing of LTC claims time bound. The following time-limits shall be followed while processing the LTC applications/claims of the Government servants.

S.No.	Course of action	Time limit
1.	Leave Sanction	5 days + 2 days*
2.	Sanction of LTC advance	5 days + 2 days*
3.	Time taken by Administration for verification of LTC claim after the LTC bill is submitted by the Government employee for settlement.	10 days + 2 days*
4.	Time taken by DDO	5 days + 2 days*
5.	Time taken by PAO	5 days + 2 days*

It may be noted that in cases where the place of posting of the Government employees is away from their Headquarters, additional 2 days transit-time may be allowed. The person proceeds on LTC after S.No.1 and 2 i.e. after ten days of applying LTC.

3. Under CCS (LTC) Ruler, the Government servants are required to inform their Controlling Officer before the journey(s) on LTC to be undertaken. It has now been decided that the Leave Sanctioning Authority shall obtain a self-certification from the employee regarding the proposed LTC journey. The proforma for self-certification has been annexed with this O.M.

4. In addition to the above, it has been decided that whenever a Government servant applies for LTC, he/she may be provided with a copy of the guidelines (enclosed) which needs to be followed while availing LTC.

5. Employees may be encouraged to share interesting insights and pictures, if any, of the destination he/she visited while availing LTC on an appropriate forum.

6. Comments of the above proposal may be furnished within 15 days via e-mail to email address jha.sn@nic.in.

Enclosures:

1) Proforma for self-certification.

2) Guidelines

(Surya Narayan Jha)

Under Secretary to the Government of India

Entire recruitment process to be completed within six months – Dopt Instructions on 11.1.2016

Entire recruitment process including and starting from advertisement, conducting written examination or holding of interview may be completed within six months.

F. No. Misc-14017/15/2015-Estt. (RR)
Government of India
Ministry of Personnel, P.G. & Pensions
Department of Personnel & Training
North Block, New Delhi

Dated: 11.1.2016

OFFICE MEMORANDUM

Subject: Instructions regarding time limit for holding examinations / interviews from the date of advertisement for the post under direct recruitment – reg.

The undersigned is directed to refer to the subject and to say that it has come to notice of this Department that there are instances of a long time lag between the date of advertisement for the vacancy and date of examination or interview. This delay may deny the opportunity to fresh candidates who become eligible during that period, while creating an atmosphere of uncertainty to candidates who have applied. .

2. All Ministries / Departments are, therefore, requested that while initiating the recruitment process to fill vacant posts(s) by the method of direct recruitment in their Ministries / Departments, it may be ensured that the entire recruitment process including and starting from advertisement, conducting written examination or holding of interview may be completed within six months.

3. The administrative Ministries / Departments may issue similar instructions to autonomous bodies / PSUs / statutory bodies under their administrative control.

(Mukesh Chaturvedi)

Director (E-I)

Delegation of powers to Heads of Offices for treatment availed in emergency circumstances- relaxation of rules regarding

Treatment availed in emergency circumstances – CGHS Orders

1967/2013/0EL/CGHS/SZ/DSZ-CGHS (P)
Government of India
Ministry of Health and Family Welfare
CGHS (P) Section

Nirman Bhavan, New Delhi
Dated the 10th December, 2015

OFFICE MEMORANDUM

Sub: Delegation of powers to Heads of Offices for treatment availed in emergency circumstances- relaxation of rules regarding.

The undersigned is directed to refer to this Ministry’s OM No. 5.12020/4/97-CGHS (P) dated 27/12/2006 and OM No. 5.14025/01/2014-MS dated 5/6/2014 vide which powers were delegated to the Head of Departments (HODs) to decide the cases of medical claims in respect of treatment obtained in emergency at private hospital/private nursing home/private clinics, subject to item-wise ceiling prescribed under CGHS/CS (MA) rules, 1944, irrespective of the financial limit on the total amount to be reimbursed.

2. The matter has been examined in this Ministry. In view of undue hardships being faced by the employees whose offices are located in far flung areas and whose HoD are at New Delhi or at any other place far away from the respective offices, if has been decided to further delegate the powers as follows:

“The Heads of Office not below the rank of Joint Secretary to the Govt.of India may decide the cases of medical claims in respect of treatment obtained in emergency at private hospital/private nursing home/private clinics, as per the item-wise ceiling prescribed under CGHS/CS (MA) rules, 1944, subject to an overall limit of Rs. 2 lakhs per case.

3. Other contents of OM No. 5.12020/4/97-CGHS (P) dated 27/12/2006 and OM No. S.14025/01/2014-MS dated 5/6/2014 will remain unchanged.

4. This issues with the approval of Additional Secretary & Director General, CGHS and shall be effective from the date of its issue.

(Sunil Kumar Gupta)
Under Secretary to the Govt. of India

 

11/01/2016 

India Post expects to collect Rs 1,500 cr through CoD in FY16

Had already collected Rs 1,000 cr through cash-on-delivery till December

The Department of Posts, which has tied-up with top e-commerce companies, expects to meet the target of Rs 1,500 crore collection through cash-on-delivery this fiscal. The Department of Posts has already collected Rs 1,000 crore through cash-on-delivery (CoD) till December. "The Postal Department has collected Rs 1,000 crore so far through CoD and this figure is likely to cross Rs 1,500 crore by the end of the current fiscal," Communications and IT Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad told PTI. The Department has partnered with e-tailers, including Flipkart, Snapdeal, Amazon, YepMe, Shopclues, for delivering pre-paid as well as CoD orders. Amazon is its largest business partner in e-Commerce. The Minister said complete revival of the postal department is his top-most priority. "I want to see India as a big hub of ecommerce, delivery and digital services," Prasad said.  Average business provided per month by major players including Amazon is 3 lakh articles, Snapdeal 80,000 articles, Myntra 50,000 articles, Flipkart 30,000 articles and Yepme 60,000 articles. 

10/01/2016 

India Post to Issue Digital Life Certificate for Pensioners 

India Post is getting ready to issue Digital Life Certificate to pensioners.  This facility can be availed from selected Post Offices across the country.  These Post Offices are already supplied with fingerprint scanner for Aadhaar authentication.

Digital life Certificate for Pensioners, the scheme of the Government of India known as Jeevan Pramaan is a biometric enabled digital service for pensioners. Pensioners of Central Government, State Government or any other Government organization can take benefit of this facility.

Digital life Certificate for Pensioners scheme of the Government of India known as Jeevan Pramaan seeks to address this very problem by digitizing the whole process of securing the life certificate. It aims to streamline the process of getting this certificate and making it hassle free and much easier for the pensioners. With this initiative the pensioners requirement to physically present himself /herself in front of disbursing agency or the certification authority will become a thing of the past benefiting the pensioners in a huge way and cutting down on unnecessary logistical hurdles.

Pensioner’s information like Pension Aadhaar number, Pensioner Name, PPO Number, Bank Account detail, Address, Mobile number etc are fed into the system though web based / client interface and finally pensioners person information are authenticated using the Aadhaar number and pensioner has to put his finger on to the finger print scanner or eye on the Iris scanner.

After successful authentication, Pramaan ID / the transaction number is displayed on the screen and same has is sent to Pensioner’s mobile as SMS from the portal.

The portal generates Electronic Jeevan Pramaan for the successfully authenticated pensioner and it is stored in the central Life Certificate Repository database.

The disbursing Post Office or Bank can access and get the Jeevan Pramaan certificate from the portal for his pensioners though the electronic data transfer mechanism created between the portal and Bank server.

Pensioner has to inform to the Post Office or Bank that his Jeevan Pramaan has been generated through online registration from Jeevan Pramaan portal inorder to get the benefit.

09/01/2016 
The Payment of Bonus (Amendment) Bill, 2015 notified:Increase in the Eligibility Limit under clause (13) of Section 2 and Calculation Ceiling under Section 12 of the Payment of Bonus Act, 2015
The Payment of Bonus (Amendment) Bill, 2015 was passed by the Parliament in the just concluded Winter Session of the Parliament. The Payment of Bonus (Amendment) Act, 2015 has been published in the Gazette of India, Extraordinary on 1st January, 2016 as Act No. 6 of 2016. The provisions of the Payment of Bonus (Amendment) Act, 2015 shall be deemed to have come into force on the 1st day of April, 2014.The Payment of Bonus (Amendment) Act, 2015 envisages enhancement of eligibility limit under section 2(13) from Rs.10,000/- per month to Rs.21,000/- per month and Calculation Ceiling under section 12 from Rs. 3500 to Rs.7000 or the minimum wage for the scheduled employment, as fixed by the appropriate Government, whichever is higher. The Payment of Bonus (Amendment) Act, 2015 also mandates previous publication of draft subordinate legislations, framed under the enabling provisions under the said Act, in the Official Gazette for inviting objections and suggestions before their final notification.
The Government has been receiving representations from trade unions for removal of all ceilings under the Payment of Bonus Act, 1965. It is also one of the demands made by them during the country-wide General Strike held in February, 2013 and September, 2015. As the last revision in these two ceilings were made in the year 2007 and was made effective from the 1st April, 2006, it was decided by the Government to make appropriate amendments to the Payment of Bonus Act, 1965.
These changes in the Payment of Bonus Act, 1965 will benefit thousands of work force.