By TIOL News Service

NEW DELHI, APR 22, 2020: THE MoS, Dr. Jitendra Singh, has commended the yeomen services rendered by Civil Servants in India's fight against COVID-19 to mark the Civil Services Day 2020 here yesterday through a nation-wide interactive video calling with 25 States and 5 UTs. Calling for greater inter-service camaraderie, citing the successful example of the CARUNA platform which brings together 29 service associations in an endeavour to support natural disasters, Dr. Singh complemented the civil servants for their support to Government's COVID 19 relief operations by offering one day salary to the Prime Minister's Cares Fund. He said that District Collectors have been leading the fight against the COVID 19 pandemic and India's prospects to contain the pandemic rested on the broad shoulders of civil servants.

Dr. Jitendra Singh said that “Minimum Government, Maximum Governance” has been the motto of the Modi Government. In the past 6 years the Nation has witnessed significant civil service reforms in reorganizing and rightsizing of Government institutions, recruitment reforms like lateral entry at Joint Secretary level, improved delivery of public services with emphasis on providing e-Services, as also several initiatives with the citizen at the centre.

The publication of the Good Governance Index and the National e-Services Delivery Assessment in 2019 represented India's endeavour to bring its civil service on par with global best practices. India's governance model has been widely recognized as promoting meritocracy and constitutional values.

Dr. Jitendra Singh said that the comprehensive revamping of the Public Grievances Redressal System was undertaken from September 2019 and this has improved the quality of grievance redressal and reduced the timelines of disposal of grievances. In this regard, he was happy to note that 25,000 COVID 19 Public Grievances were redressed on the National Monitor for COVID 19 Public Grievances ( https://www.darpg.gov.in ) in a span of 20 days from April 1 – 20, 2020 with an average disposal time of 1.57 days/ grievance.

The Civil Services Day events to be held on 21 April 2020, have been deferred due to announcement of National Lockdown, following the global outbreak of COVID 19 pandemic. The Prime Minister's Awards for Excellence in Public Administration 2019 and 2020 will now be presented on October 31, 2020 to mark the birth anniversary of Sardar Vallabhai Patel.

Dr Jitendra Singh also expressed satisfaction that so far more than 1,44,736 persons have enrolled at the DoPT'se-learning platform ( https://igot.gov.in ) to combat COVID, which was launched on 8 th of this Month and about 96,268 candidates completed the course.

It is also pertinent to mention here that civil servants for their support to Government's COVID 19 relief operations in various Ministries of the Central Government have contributed more than Rs 4227 Crore to the PM CARES FUND so far by offering one day salary and through CSR contributions.