Bengaluru: The Karnataka government has directed officials to strictly follow the provisions of the Secretariat Manual-2005 to ensure faster disposal of files and reduce delays in administrative decision-making.
The Department of Personnel and Administrative Reforms has issued a circular instructing section officers and senior officials not to keep new correspondence or files pending without valid reasons. Files received during the day should be disposed of on the same day, wherever possible. In unavoidable cases, officials must record the reasons for the delay in writing and bring them to the notice of their superiors.
The circular also introduces a system for regular monitoring of pending files. Junior assistants and equivalent employees have been directed to prepare lists of files pending at the end of the previous month, along with files disposed of and receipts that have not been converted into files. These lists must be prepared by the third working day of every month.
Under the monitoring mechanism, under secretaries will review files pending for up to two years, while secretaries, joint secretaries and deputy secretaries will examine files pending for two to four years. Department secretaries will review cases that have remained pending for more than four years.
The government has also directed departmental heads to bring to the personal attention of the concerned secretaries complete lists of cases that have remained pending for more than three months for final orders. The secretaries have been asked to examine the reasons for the delay and initiate steps for their early disposal.
Cases pending for more than one month will be reviewed by secretaries, who must submit monthly reports to the chief secretary. Personal secretaries to ministers will also prepare lists of cases pending with their respective ministers and submit them through the chief secretary to the chief minister during the first week of the following month.
The circular further requires departments to submit action-taken reports on file disposal to the Department of Personnel and Administrative Reforms on the second Monday of every month.
The move comes after the government recently introduced the Praja Seva initiative aimed at taking grievance redressal closer to citizens through ministers and legislators. The latest directions seek to improve internal administrative efficiency and ensure that official files are not unnecessarily delayed.
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