Working Sunday for Karnataka’s babus as they will clear pending files today

BANGALORE: It’s Sunday morning blues for babudom today. Key bureaucrats and their staff, in a drastic departure from norm, will march to Vidhana Soudha to put in a hard day’s work.
The decision to work on Sunday was triggered after an upset chief minister, at a recent cabinet meeting, expressed concern over a pileup of 2 lakh files, across departments.Siddaramaiah asked chief secretary Kaushik Mukherjee to oversee their clearance and report to him. Much like PM Modi’s diktat to central government bureaucrats to have clean desks, bare of files.
It will be the first working Sunday for chiefs of key departments like home, finance, urban development, revenue, personnel and administrative reforms, and primary and secondary education who will be in Vidhana Soudha to clear as many files as possible. No visitors will be allowed inside the secretariat, and lift operators have been asked to work too.
Mukherjee, who is on a drive since September 3 to dispose of files, expects nearly 20,000-25,000 files to be cleared.
“Section and under secretaries have been warned that they would be held accountable if any file is left unattended beyond 48 hours. Serious action will be initiated and I’ve planned a random inspection on Monday,” Mukherjee said.
Ever since the drive was taken up, nearly 30,000 files were cleared in key departments. “Barring files that are held up by courts, those that can improve governance will be cleared. I’ll be present in office on Sunday to monitor work,” Mukherjee said.

Chief minister Siddaramaiah
A senior official of the urban development department agreed that working on a Sunday is rare, and he cannot afford to be absent because portfolios related to Bangalore, like BDA, BBMP, BWSSB and BMRDA, are held by the CM. “The CM is personally monitoring progress and his office is regularly tracking the number of files pending and cleared over the past week,” he said.
Lengthy weekends are another reason for the government to take up the file clearance drive. Last week had a string of five holidays, with Gowri-Ganesha celebrations followed by a weekend. There are more holidays on the horizon, as October opens with Gandhi Jayanthi, Ayudha Puja, a weekend and Bakrid.
The CM has also instructed his cabinet colleagues to take the lead in this drive, and directed them to be present at the Soudha for two full days in a week to clear pending files.
Sunday drive
CM frowns at pileup of 2 lakh files across depts
Key departments at work: home, finance, urban development, revenue, DPAR, primary and secondary education
Chief secy expects 20,000 files to be cleared today
File clearance drive taken up on Sept 3
TIMES VIEW
For too long the government has condoned delay in clearing of files. And now it has a situation where bureaucrats and their staff are working on a Sunday to tackle the backlog.
This smacks of inefficiency on two counts.
First, they create a problem and then they try and solve it with a desperate measure like working on a weekly holiday.
It's now being gradually acknowledged that it's very important for employees to rest well over the weekend so that they can be work more efficiently during the week. Such file-clearing binges will work only in the short term.