Kerala: Aadhaar punching at govt offices

Thiruvananthapuram: The government has decided to make biometric punching system mandatory in all government departments within six months and in civil stations in three months.

The General Administration Department (GAD) has issued an order in this connection. The GAD will link biometric punching system with the SPARK salary software. The punching system will be Aadhaar based as well. The system is being introduced in government departments to increase efficiency, output of the staff and improve public delivery mechanism.

Though the process of linking attendance with salary was initiated eight months ago, it could not take off.

The devastating floods which wreaked havoc and the shifting of GAD secretary Biswanath Sinha, had resulted in the
delay.

The GAD had earlier issued an order linking salary with biometric punching system in Secretariat. The employees had to show the biometric card and then place index finger on the machine. Once it was done, the attendance details got transferred to the Spark salary software.

Initially, the linkage was planned for salary bills of GAD, law and finance. The salary bills are prepared based on attendance day from 16th of a month to 15th of the next month.

The GAD had also developed separate modules in Spark system for recording the details of leave, official tour, compensatory off and shift system. Attendance Monitoring Cell was also constituted with a nodal officer from GAD to keep an eye on the attendance management system in secretariat.