Madurai: Growing vacancies in the Tamil Nadu power board are reportedly pushing up workload for existing staff and affecting services provided to electricity consumers.
In a white paper, Electricity Minister Nirmalkumar said there are 65,921 vacant posts and that steps would be taken to fill them soon. However, those who have already cleared board examinations and contract workers waiting for permanent appointments say the waiting list continues to grow.
Trade unions have warned that key posts such as bill assessors and field staff are more than 60% vacant, leading to disruptions and even losses in electricity bill revenue. They pointed out that a recruitment exam for field assistants was held last year and the rank list was released in May, but candidates who cleared the written test are still awaiting announcements for the physical test.
The minister’s recent statement about appointing 10,000 field workers on a contract basis has also triggered dissatisfaction among those who wrote the recruitment exam. Separately, unions noted that under the 2018 workload agreement, more than 6,000 posts remain vacant out of 7,591 sanctioned bill assessor positions, forcing even promoted inspectors to continue doing billing work.
In areas without assessors, retired personnel are reportedly engaged through outsourcing. With assessors not being appointed in proportion to the number of connections, unions say multiple irregularities are emerging, and they have urged the government to fill vacancies at the earliest.
