Itanagar: Arunachal Pradesh Chief Minister Pema Khandu on Tuesday termed the civil servants as backbone of the Government who work as a bridge between the common people and the Government as all the policies and programmes are executed through them.
“You have the onus of ensuring every single paisa of development fund is being judiciously used for welfare of common people,” Khandu told the 2020 batch of Arunachal Pradesh Civil Service (APCS) probationers while flagging-off their foundation training at the DK Convention Centre here.
The CM advised the civil servant probationers to always be approachable by the common people, be innovative and create solutions to problems.
“Politicians will come and go every five years but you will be the permanent upholders of democracy,” said Khandu.
Emphasising on the importance of training, he said officers without training will be like a misguided missile and urged upon the young officers to sincerely attend each course of the four-month long foundation training.
“This is not a flagging off ceremony…this is the foundation laying ceremony of your career,” he said.
Khandu said that the four-month foundation training is first of its kind wherein the probationers will first undergo a course in IIM, Shillong, then at the Lal Bahadur Shastri National Academy of Administration (LBSNAA), Mussoorie, followed by a training program at Arun Jaitley National
Institute of Financial Management, Faridabad and finally at the state Administrative Training Institute, Naharlagun.
It may be noted that Khandu who visited LBSNAA on invitation to address the 2019 batch of IAS probationers had requested the authorities of the academy to help Arunachal Pradesh in whatever way possible. As a result for the first time an Arunachal Study Circle was formed in LNSNAA, where the 2020 batch APCS probationers will be trained for about a week.
Also, recently the state government had signed an MoU with Dr APJ Abdul Kalam Centre for Policy Research and Analysis, IIM Shillong for collaborating as a knowledge partner for capacity building of state government officers and to set up a satellite centre of IIM-S in the state for necessary policy interventions.
“We had announced in the Budget 2018-19 that our own Administrative Training Institute (ATI) would be converted into a state of the art training institute . Work on its upgradation is going on,” Khandu informed.
He further informed that to improve service delivery, the government enacted the Public Service Delivery Act, 2015 for prompt delivery of services to the citizen within a notified time frame, with provision of penalty for any delay in such delivery by the public servants.
He also suggested that after completion of the foundation training, the officers submit a report to the chief secretary on what they have learnt or gained that will help them discharge their duties and suggest if anything needs to be changed or added to the training program so that it can be further improved for future APCS officers.
Altogether 57, including three differently abled, officers of the 2020 APCS batch will be attending the training program.
Meanwhile, on the occasion the newly compiled web portal of the ATI was launched by the CM.
The ceremony was also attended by Deputy Chief Minister Chowna Mein.