Towards the progress of the state or mockery of the system

By: Dr. Sudarshan Kumar Vatsyayan

On one side, the state poses that they are seeking highly educated and talented people with vast experience to ensure that the new talent will bring in new experience into the organisation. But in our state, it seems that the situation is otherway round. All one needs is a certificate from a political party to twist the rules in one’s favor. As long as merit is discouraged, and such hypocracies are promoted, we are bound to be the worst performing state in all the aspects. It will take another 200 years for us to reach the level what other countries are there today. We do not expect this from a forward looking Govt of Himachal Pradesh. Even if a certain party wants to put its stooges in plum posts, there is no dearth of educated people in those parties.

Just a comparison

South Korea and Japan were totally destroyed by the second world war and Korean war. Their reconstruction work started after the second world war. Whereas India was in a much better situation at the time of independence. Today Japan and Korea are either as good as Europe and US or much better than them in many aspects. Then how could Japan and Korea progress so well in the last 60 years compared to India? You comments are welcome.

KCC Bank reduces basic qualification for GM
Tribune Story

Dharamsala, November 28
A political qualification is more important to get a top job in Kangra Central Cooperative Bank (KCCB), the biggest cooperative bank of the state, than education qualification.

The recent decision taken by the board of KCCB is a clear illustration of the fact. The KCCB board at a meeting held yesterday approved new qualification for the post of General Manager of the bank. As per the earlier qualification the basic qualification for the post of GM in the bank was graduation and diploma in cooperation. However, according to a decision taken by the bank board yesterday the new qualification for GM post would be just matriculation.

Interestingly, while the basic qualification for recruitment as clerk in the KCCB is 10+2 along with knowledge of computers, the qualification of GM who would manage almost all the branches of the bank has been reduced to just matriculation.

The chairman of the bank Rasil Singh Mankotia when asked to justify the reduction in qualification for the post of GM said that it had been done earlier also and the board of the bank was empowered to reduce the qualification.

However, the sources available here said that the qualification for the post of GM in KCCB had been reduced to promote a bank officer from Hamirpur district represented by the CM.

The investigation revealed that the board of KCCB increased the basic qualification for the post GM to graduation in 1982. In 1997 the board added another qualification diploma in cooperation as essential qualification for appointing GM of the bank. However, after more than 26 years of increasing the basic qualification to graduation once again it has been reduced to matriculation.

The decision of the KCCB board is also against the guidelines of NABARD that is controlling and financing body of cooperative financial institutions in the country. As per the directions of NABARD the GM of any cooperative bank should be at least a graduate. The officials of NABARD when contacted while speaking on the condition of anonymity admitted that basic qualification for GM of any cooperative bank should be graduation.

In the recent past the present government nominated three persons to the board of KCCB. As per the directions of NABARD the nominated persons to the cooperative bank board should also be graduates. However, the all three members nominated by present government are undergraduates.

In a time when cooperative banks are facing competition and demand is being raised to recruit professionals with higher qualifications for managing the financial institutions, the decision of KCCB is likely to face criticism from various sections.

The recruitment in KCCB is already under scanner of the vigilance.