There are more than 1,700 vacant posts at various levels of the state government, a Right to Information (RTI) request has found, with more than 500 of these in the Health Department.
Addressing a press conference today, RTI activist Disparsing Rani said that official answers reveal that 1,708 posts in 15 different government departments are vacant. The true figure is probably higher as he has yet to receive responses from a handful of other departments.
As many as 547 of these are in the Health Department, that is excluding East Khasi Hills, Jowai and Tura.
Among the others, 183 vacant posts are in Water Resources, 133 in Statistics, 31 in Horticulture, 35 in Agriculture, 226 in Soil and Water Conservation, 113 in Commerce and Industry, 148 in Printing and Stationery, 30 in Sports and Youth Affairs, 90 in the State Rural Livelihood Society, 97 in Forest, 19 in Public Works Department and 26 in Education.
Rani also claimed that officiating appointments and those on compassionate grounds, practices that he said were abolished in 1997 and 2010, are still being made by some departments.
In December, while pointing out that more than 200 sanctioned posts in the Directorate of Sericulture and Weaving were vacant, Rani said that government jobs remain unfilled because of weaknesses in Meghalaya’s service rules.
“It’s a known fact that some influential people hold more than three high level posts in the government while most of the other posts remain vacant. Bribery … is also required for promotion in various government departments,” he said at the time.
