District education officer rules a burden for staff-starved dept

Charity doesn't begin at home, at least not for the education department of the state. The department, which has often implemented changes and formulated new rules like the semester system and revision of syllabi, is yet to make changes in its own office i.e. the office of the District Education Officer.

Officials of the DEO complain that the office still follows rules framed in 1970. It means the rules, which haven't been revised since 40 years, continue to paralyse the staff and has led to increased workload and other complications.

For instance, an Assistant Education officer (AEO) is required to handle 50 schools on an average, but over a period of time as the number of schools has increased, the AEO now has to handle more than 80 schools, which is a burden, complains an officer.

Coincidentally, according to the rules, the standards and appointment rules, and the pre decided rules for each officer of DEO should be revised regularly by the state government.

"We have been experiencing greater workload as the rules haven't been revised since 40 years," said a source requesting anonymity.
Due to this, several important functions of the DEO office, like academic and administrative inspection of the schools and giving them guidance, get affected as the employees aren't able to allot enough time for each school and its inspection.

When DNA approached RI Patel, the District Education Officer of the city, he said, "It is true that there is a shortage of staff in our office, but this has not led to an increase in workload. The higher officials are considering filling up the vacancies through promotions, which will be done in few days." Elaborating on the vacancies, he said that there are 8 vacancies for the post of Class 2 officers.

However, higher officials from the Commissioner of Schools office said, "These are all excuses given by people who do not want to work. In fact, the work load has been decreased to a great extent since the last 10 years thanks to computerisation and other processes."