Power staff protest govt interference
Tribune News Service

Patiala, December 15
The PSEB Engineers Association has called a meeting on December 17 to work out a strategy to stop government interference in day to day working of the PSEB.

Stating this here yesterday, general secretary of the association Bhupinder Singh said the association, in a letter to the Chief Minister, had expressed its concern on the manner in which the power sector was being managed by the board and the state government.

Criticising the practice of the board to seek prior permission of the Chief Minister’s office before issuing transfer, posting or promotion orders to engineers, Bhupinder referred to a meeting held with the Chief Minister on November 6 wherein it had been assured that the matter would be sorted out to ensure timely promotion of engineers.

However, despite repeated assurances from the management, promotion orders of assistant executive engineers and senior executive engineers have not been effected for the past six months.

Taking over the functioning of the board management indicates the state government “doubts” the capabilities of the present management. In such a scenario, it would be prudent to bring more effective management rather than taking over its functions.

The association said cases of new domestic connections in many circles of the board had been pending for more than 16 months due to unavailability of material.