Staff division between Telangana and Andhra Pradesh in limbo

Hyderabad: The distribution of state-cadre staff between Telangana and AP has made little headway in the last nine months though the tenure of the Centre-appointed Kamalnathan Committee is set to end by this month-end.

The former UPA government had appointed the Committee in March 2014 with a one-year tenure to monitor the distribution of around 56,000 state-cadre staff between TS and AP.

However, the chances of the Committee completing the process by March 31 looks remote since it is currently in the process of seeking “options” from employees over choosing their state.

Both governments are now planning to urge the Centre to extend the Committee’s tenure by another year to complete the distribution of staff.

Chief secretaries of AP and TS, Mr I.Y.R. Krishna Rao and Mr Rajeev Sharma, are likely to write a joint letter to the Centre soon, seeking extension of the committee’s tenure by a year. The distribution process is expected to take a few more months since the Committee has to scrutinise the applications of each and every employee on their “nativity” claims, since it has been receiving many complaints about employees giving false records to claim nativity of TS to work in Hyderabad.

TS employees in the commercial taxes department even went on an agitation from Tuesday alleging submission of fake nativity certificates by some Seemandhra employees and misuse of “options” given by the Committee.

The Committee has managed to complete the distribution of only 250 employees in seven departments so far. The distribution of over 50,000 employees is still pending even nine months after AP was bifurcated.