Kerala is grappling with the acute shortage of IAS officers resulting in the pending files piling up. According to a rough estimate, around three lakh files are lying pending in the state secretariat. The shortage of officers has created imbalance in the bureaucracy with some officers burdened with the responsibilities of several departments and a few others having less work.
The state currently has only 126 IAS officers against the sanctioned strength of 231. The situation has been aggravated by the fact that several senior officers are on central deputation and many are on election duties as observers in other states.
This shortage has resulted in the growing backlog of files. The crucial Finance Department seems to have been worst hit with as many as 26,257 files remaining pending. Dr. Jayathilak (IAS:1991:KL), serving as Additional Chief Secretary of the Finance Department, has been given additional charge of the Tax Department due to the shortage. Usually, Finance Secretaries are not assigned extra responsibilities, but the Tax Department, which has 10 sections and is one of the largest wings within the Secretariat, has added to his workload, slowing down the pace of decision-making.
IAS officer A. Kowsigan (IAS:2009:KN), who used to manage five departments, later reported his inability to process files due to work load after which one department was taken away from him. Senior and trusted bureaucrat K R Jyothilal (IAS:1993:KL) has the responsibility of four key departments like electricity and transport.
Similarly, Puneet Kumar (IAS:1993:KL) is managing four departments, while Tinku Biswal (IAS:1997:KL) and Biju Prabhakar (IAS:2004:KL) are handling three each. Kerala needs to address this issue immediately in order to deliver results.
