Paper Presented by SG NFPE

8/14/2019 Paper Presented by SG NFPE

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Paper Presented By

Secretary GeneralNational Federation of Postal Employees

In the National Seminar On

TECHNOLOGY SWEEP IN DEPARTMENT OF POSTSPRESENT & FUTURE VISION

CHALLENGES BEOFORE MANAGEMENT AND STAFFROLE OF SYSTEM ADMINISTRATORS

Dear President Respected Chief Guest the Member Technology PostalServices Board Office Bearers of NFPE General Secretaries of AffiliatedUnions and System Administrators from all over the country - National

Federation of Postal Employees extends a very warm welcome to all of you inthis All India Seminar. It is indeed our pleasure to have the MemberTechnology with us today as our Chief Guest for the presentation of hisvaluable paper and Speech on the theme of this Seminar organised by theNational Federation of Postal Employees.

Technology is getting revolutionised every day and its sweep is universal. Weall know that the change in production machinery is a continuous process inthe development of human history. Social Science teaches us that with thischange in production tools the whole relations between various sections ofhuman society also changes. Modern Society however relies on the

revolutionary changes in production tools for its continued existence. We livein a modern society and therefore the revolutionising of the production tools isa regular process occurring frequently. Those who possess the technologyand the technological tools will alone be able to dominate and this applies tocountry or industry or every field. Postal Departments are no exception to thisrule. If these ever changing technological tools are not brought into its ownoperations, the Indian Postal Department also cannot survive in the world ofstiff competition caused by the dictates of liberalisation and globalisation.

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The Indian Postal Departments entry into the new technology and its growthhas been slow in comparison to the advanced western countries and some ofthe countries of Asia Pacific Region. However the trend has been changedand India Post is embarking into a high-tech postal operative organisationstep by step. Computerisation of Postal Operations in all Head Post Offices,

Divisional Offices and Regional and Circle Offices as well as 24,000Departmental Sub Offices have been completed. Extending thecomputerisation to 60,000 Branch Offices is in the offing as per the Five YearPlan Guidelines. RFID technology has been introduced recently in Indiaamongst 30 other nations and this may be extended large scale soon.Networking of PLI operations by establishing a Central Server; Networking ofall offices in order to enter into core-banking services of our POSB Operationsetc are awaiting to be launched soon. More over the Department of Posts hasentered into an MOU with the Technology Consultant ACCENTURE fordesigning and developing a new information technology architecture andsystem. Thus the technology sweep in the Department of Posts is anticipated

to reach very high level in the coming months.

As part of the technology sweep, the entire staffs of the Department are to betrained and retrained to adapt to the new technology environment. This is oneof the challenges before the Department that contains a large work force notfully tuned to work in a most modern technological environment. It is also afact that the Department lacks infrastructure facilities for launching massivetraining and retraining programmes for its very large work force. Trainingprogrammes were indeed launched and continuing but still inadequate to trainthe staff in handling the technology. Funding for imparting computer skills inrenowned institutions like NIFT etc have not been encouraged due to eitherlack of funds and absence of administrative initiative. A large work force wasexpected to learn technology by its own individual efforts which are achallenge to employees because most of the staff had never even operated atype writer machine. The Department was handicapped with the lack of freshtalent from market entering the India Post due to ban on recruitment etc. Entryof fresh talent in different cadres would have helped enormously.

The lack of technical knowledge had led the department to waste itsresources also in the purchase of outdated technology in the shape ofestablishment of AMPCs. The affair turned out to be too costly and wastage

since we lacked operational knowledge and the technical know how and wewere forced to import any spare part from the manufacturer only. We have notbeen able to use the technology to its fullest capacity and such giganticmachines are not being operated to its potential is a open secret. Theadvanced countries have gone for further improved automated machines butare selling their outdated machines to under-developed countries.

The Department also was handicapped with the absence of a TechnologyWing with expert personnel for establishing the infrastructure all over thecountry. But the knowledgeable layer of Postal Assistants and SortingAssistants have come forward with initiative and enthusiasm in this gigantic

work and grew in practical experience in administering a vast network ofcomputerised operations efficiently. They were subsequently got the new

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nomenclature System Administrators without any such cadre came intobeing officially. Thus one of the challenges and costliest operations forestablishing computerized operations at the all India level of a very vastnetworked department had been accomplished without any extra expenditure.Through these System Administrators most of the staffs have come to learn to

handle computers in their day to day operations and thus one of the biggestchallenges before the Administration has been moderately over come. Butthere is inadequacy in the level of training and retraining required.

Now the face of India Post is changing very fast. Higher level of technology isbeing inducted in different fields in addition to large scale computerisation. It isour estimation that this will definitely necessitate augmentation of the strengthof System Administrators in accordance with the level of expansion. But thereis always a question that what type of infrastructure will be in place to handlethe technology in future. The System Administrators themselves are not acadre approved by the Recruitment Rules.

The role of Mysore Postal Training College in developing indigenous softwarein several operations of India Post without depending on IT outsiders is amarvel. The role of System Administrators had been very fundamental inestablishing and running of the computerized operations of India Post. It is ourmodest expectation that these services and huge contribution of the tech-savvy officials of Department of Posts that saved the Department of Postscrores of rupees expenditure for more than a decade, will receive duerecognition of the Postal Services Board and they will be absorbed in any typeof technology wing that may come into being shortly.

NFPE analyses to discover that the actual work of System Administratorspresently is not one of Data Entry Operation. It is equal to computer engineerwho attends to system faults, software installation, imparting training to staffboth supervisory and operative, attend to trouble shooting of all nature,installation of computers in offices, taking backup of all data, attending tonetworking in offices etc. It has been the policy of the 6 th CPC to offer PB-2with 4200/- Grade Pay for all Data Processing Assistants in all departments.Unfortunately the System Administrators who perform duties like that of acomputer engineer with work stress much more than the data processingassistants are placed in the level of Data entry operators because there had

been no cadre created for System Administrators so far in the Department ofPosts. Therefore the work of system administration has been performed formore than 10 years by these System Administrators for a lesser wage levelwithout any additional monetary compensation.

In addition to the above, it is also a matter of concern that these SystemAdministrators have been one of the most exploited unintentionally if not bydesign. They have no work norms and therefore any office, any time, any day,any climate and any problem, they have to attend trouble shooting. This factoris ignored by some part of Administration and even the accidents occurredafter 6 P.M. are treated as beyond office hours and facilities like disability

leave etc are denied. They are not provided for any road mileage allowance orany other compensation in many circles leaving them spend from their own

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pockets. There has to be a work norm and scientific work allocation underwhich system administrators are to be allotted based on number of computersor number of offices within certain radius etc. The absence of such norms hadresulted in extreme work pressure and strain on them and even leading toissue of charge sheets against system administrators in some places and for

lapses committed by other staff, the system administrators are madesubsidiary offenders. There has to be a system of monetary compensation forthe extra time put in by these staff beyond their normal eight hours of regularwork and invariably no OTA or financial compensation had been claimed orsanctioned for all the hours of extra work put in by them beyond eight hours.The untimely calls on any day including Sundays and holidays by staff to thepersonal cell phones of system administrators are in fact intrusion into theprivacy. Provision of departmental cell phones exclusively for official use istherefore fully justified. The System Administrators have to learn and mastereach and every patch supplied by Department and has to be in constant lookout and monitoring of work performed by offices. Therefore every System

Administrator has to be supplied with an Official Computer for installation inthe residence of these staff. The System Administrators are serving in thecapacity of technology teaching faculty but they are not sanctioned with thebenefits normally sanctioned to faculty in Postal Training Centres. In fact the90% of technology training is being imparted to staff by the SystemAdministrators only. NFPE requests our Chief Guest, the Postal ServicesBoard Member Technology that he may kindly intervene to cause properorder to deal all the above situations. While doing so, the demands in thecharter annexed to this paper may also be given due consideration.

Sir, these Officials have worked without any such benefits, which alone showthat there is every justification for recognizing their services and incorporatingthem in the new technology wing as System Administrators Cadre. We areapprehensive that without a favourable disposition from the Postal Board thismay not ever take off.

Taking in the consideration of all the above aspects, NFPE strongly desires tohave a separate cadre called Systems Administrators in the technology wingof the Department of Posts. As the existing System Administrators haveproved their competence and excellence during the past decade, all of themshall be absorbed as Systems Administrators in the newly created cadre as a

one time measure, if need be, through a trade test. In future, this cadre shallbe a promotional cadre for the PAs/SAs and selection can be made through aqualifying/competitive examination/trade test. In future, suitable educationalqualifications can also be fixed taking into account that most of the newlyrecruited PA/SAs are having sufficient technical Qualifications. For theexisting System Administrators, the higher Qualification condition should bewaived.

In nutshell. It is the request of the NFPE before the Postal Services Board totake into account the valuable services being rendered by the existing System

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Administrators, without which the Department of Posts could not haveattained the degree of success with the installation of the computerinfrastructure and work operations in the different software we use for postaloperative and administrative work. NFPE also points out that this conversion

of Postal Assistants / Sorting Assistants cadre into System Administrative staffwill be more economical and contains sufficient operational advantages incontrast to total outsourcing of our functions or for opting for full scalerecruitment from open market. The Postal Services Board is requested toconsider these merits and go for appropriate cadre creation paving way forabsorption of present System Administrators in the new set up withappropriate higher level of pay package admissible at least on par with that ofthe data processing assistants in other Central Government Departments atthe entry level with a structure of promotions above. We are confident that ourrespected Member Technology Postal Services Board will appreciate theabove facts and will be kind enough to take this matter for the due

consideration of the Postal Board and for very positive results.

National Federation of Postal Employees extends its hearty thanks to ourMember Technology Postal Services Board for immediately consenting toparticipate in this All India Seminar when requested and for attending andpresenting the Main Paper on the theme of Seminar as our Chief Guest. Wealso thank the entire System Administrators who have come from all over thecountry responding magnificently to the call of the NFPE.

K.RagavendranNew Delhi Secretary General21.11.2009 National Federation of Postal Employees

ANNEXURE

LIST OF ISSUES REQUIRE IMMEDIATE CONSIDERATION ON

THE WORKING CONDITIONS OF SYSTEMS

ADMINISTRATORS

1. Special Allowance: - Notwithstanding with our demand offormation of separate cadre of Systems Administrators in theDepartment of Posts with separate pay scale till theaugmentation, the existing incumbents may be granted specialallowance to the extent of 10% Pay plus Grade pay as it isgranted to care takers.2. Issue of uniform duties & responsibilities: - There is nouniformity in the duties and responsibilities. This varies fromcircle to circle even regions with in the circle. A uniform viable

duties & responsibilities may be circulated from the Directorate.

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Identify adequate number of systems Administrators post ineach division/circles.3. Providing Laptops: - The Systems Administrators find itdifficult to download and test the given patches and softwarewith the non availability of systems. One laptop may be provided

for smooth facilitation of the process and for mobility purposes inattending computer related works in other stations.4. Incentive for installation/upgradation: - Many softwarecould be installed only after the closing hours and will end in themidnight. Incentive for installation/upgradation may be fixed andpaid.5. Training Allowance/honorarium: - For imparting training atWCTCS and for MSE, the Systems Administrators may be granted Training Allowance/honorarium.6. Accidental insurance: - For travelling extensively throughtwo wheelers to attend the technical problems, an accidentalinsurance coverage may be provided.7. Grant of Special disability leave: - The S. A. of Delhi WestDivision met with a road accident after installing software in thenight. No special disability leave was granted to the official.Provision of special disability leave on such happening should beensured.8. Grant of Excess Duty Allowance: - For keeping beyond 8hours on any day for any work, they should be granted withExcess Duty Allowance or OTA.9. Provide cash imprest: - To meet out the immediate

requirements while attending problems in computers, a separatecash imprest may be provided.10. Grant of TA & Road Mileage Allowance: - Withinurban cities, the road mileage allowance and out stations, TAmay be granted for the journey performed for attendingcomputers.11. Mobile Phone & Recharge coupons: - Mobile phonesmay be supplied to the system administrators & a minimum ofRs.500/- may be allowed per month for recharging the coupon forthe Mobile connection.12. Providing kit box: - They should be provided with kit

bag containing net driver set, CD bag, pen drive, handy vacuumcleaner etc.13. Providing a seat in office: - They should be provideda seat at server. Now in many places, they have not beenprovided with separate seating facility.14. Keeping Panel: - A panel should be maintained atDivisional level and the SAs should not be reverted back asPostal Assistant without any sound reasons.15. Possession of SQL Password: - The possession ofSQL Password may be conferred with the Head of the office after

imparting training to overcome the problem of immediate

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solution of technical problems as this is now vested with thedivisional heads.

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Paper Presented by SG NFPE

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