Daily Times

ISLAMABAD: The Capital Development Authority (CDA) has warned habitual late comers and absent employees for strict action on the basis of a data generated by the Information Technology Directorate. However a large number of the civic body’s offices are still out of the reach from the Biometric Attendance System.

Currently, only the chairman secretariat and capital hospital have the facility of biometric attendance while all other offices such as F-9 Park, Iqbal Hall etc. are using the traditional ways of recording attendance of their staff.

Member Administration, CDA, Muhammad Yasir Pirzada has issued a circular whereby all the directorates of the CDA have been asked to inform the Authority about the action taken against the habitual late comers and absent employees. The Member Administration has further directed all the directorates to submit their replies within seven days.

The date generated by the Information Technology Directorate of CDA regarding late comers and absent employees contains names, designations, departments, basic pay scales and employee numbers.

The data further contains the number of days of employees when they were absent. The percentage of user count, presence, early left and late off employees is also part of the data. The data has been generated for the months of November and December 2016.

Sources inside the civic body claimed that several officers of even the director level are not willing to use the biometric attendance system as they feel ashamed to get themselves enrolled in the system then how the policy can be enforced on junior staff in letter and spirit.

They further briefed that on the basis of which date, the member has issued a circular is not a true representation of facts as it has several flaws whereas it is not fully up to date.

For instance, if a person has been transferred from one directorate to other than he will be marked absent from his duty till his status has been upgraded in the system. On the other side, a large number of staff is still out of the reach of the biometric attendance system while the major hurdle in the shift of the attendance record on the biometric system is the field staff, who usually perform their duties at different corners of the city and it is difficult for them to first visit the office then go in the field.

However, the Authority is planning to launch portable biometric devices to record the attendance of field staff on the spot and a survey in this regard has already been under way in the civic body.

While talking to Daily Times, the Member Administration Yasir Perzada said: “The proper use of already installed machines is the first step whereas subsequently we are going to invite the tenders to instal the biometric attendance system in the remaining offices of the civic body very soon.” He stressed that without maintaining discipline and a professional working environment, no organisation can serve the masses effectively and efficiently.

Meanwhile, on Wednesday while following his strategy of “right sizing and right people for right job”, the Member Administration CDA also placed the services of 15 more staff members at the disposal of Arts and Craft village. These people were either absent from their duties or were appointed at irrelevant places.

Earlier, besides transfer posting of officerd within the civic body, the member was also cancelled the attachment of a dozen security guards and put them under the control of the enforcement directorate.

Bad governance, malpractices and unwillingness to work are no secret in the civic body.