No 360-degree system for appraisal of civil servants, says DoPT to CAT

The Department of Personnel and Training (DoPT) has filed an affidavit before the Nainital circuit bench of the Central Administrative Tribunal, saying there is no 360-degree system for appraisal of civil servants.

The assertion by the DoPT, which works under the Union Ministry of Personnel, Public Grievances and Pensions, comes in response to a petition filed by Indian Forest Service (IFS) officer Sanjiv Chaturvedi in December last year.

Chaturvedi, a 2002-batch IFS officer of the Uttarakhand cadre, had sought directions to the central government to produce all documents, appraisals, reports of expert committees, civil services board (CSB) and findings of competent authorities related to the rejection of his application for empanelment at the level of joint secretary or equivalent in the central government.

 

The officer was conveyed his non-empanelment for holding the post of joint secretary or equivalent by the Appointments Committee of the Cabinet (ACC) through an order dated November 15, 2022, by the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change.

The tribunal issued notices to the central government on December 20 last year.

In a counter-affidavit filed before the Nainital circuit bench of the tribunal, the DoPT said the "petition/application as filed by the applicant is liable to be dismissed as the applicant is seeking records of 360-degree appraisal and which records do not exist".

The affidavit also referred to an earlier application filed by Chaturvedi pending with "the principal bench, New Delhi", in which "the applicant has prayed for quashing the system of 360-degree appraisal".

"...it has already been stated in the counter reply that no such system is there in the Govt. of India," read the reply dated October 9, 2023.

The DoPT further said that empanelment to the post of joint secretary or equivalent in the government of India is not to be considered a promotion.

"The empanelment itself is not a matter of right or can be claimed as such. It is up to the competent authority to decide the suitability, as per laid down guidelines, for empanelment in the government of India," the reply said.

This assumes significance as the DoPT had in a written submission to a parliamentary panel in 2017 said that revised guidelines for empanelment were put in place in April 2016 which provide for the collection of multi-source feedback (MSF) from a minimum of five stakeholders such as seniors, juniors, peers, external stakeholders and serving secretaries.

"This is known as the 360-degree review and is the same as MSF," said the 92nd report on "appraisal and empanelment of civil servants under the central government" of the Department-related Parliamentary Standing Committee on Personnel, Public Grievances, Law and Justice, tabled in Parliament in August 2017.

The 360-degree appraisal, also called the MSF, is now being used for appraisal of officers from the all-India services and other central government group 'A' services for empanelling them to the post of joint secretary and above in the government of India, according to the panel's report.

The committee in its report also said that it "finds the present 360-degree appraisal system opaque, non-transparent and subjective".

The next date of hearing in the case is fixed for November 21.