'Output not suffered in work from home, rather increased in some cases'

New Delhi, Jan 20 (IANS) The Union Minister of State for Personnel, Public Grievances, Pensions Jitendra Singh on Wednesday said that due to 'Work From Home' (WFH) during ongoing surge in Covid 19 cases, the work output has not suffered rather it has increased in some cases due to target oriented work culture with flexible timing.

The minister, while talking to the officials and staff of his Ministry virtually, said that the overall output was also better due to near total adoption of e-office mode and WFH also resulted in employees working during weekends and holidays to achieve the given target.

Singh said that out of 663 officers and staff of Department of Personnel and Training (DoPT), 46 got infected with mild symptoms and 20 of them already recovered.

Similarly, eight persons out of 158 from Department of Administrative Reform and Public Grievances (DARPG) and six employees out of 58 from Department of Pensions got infected in the third wave, however not a single case of hospitalisation was reported so far.

The minister inquired about the well-being of the officers and staff who are under quarantine or infected by Covid-19 and also asked them to share their experience as well as suggestions.

Singh noted that as per the latest 'Office Memorandum' of DoPT, the pregnant women employees and Divyang employees have been exempted from attending office while the physical attendance of government servants below the level of Under Secretary has been restricted to 50 per cent of the actual strength and the remaining 50 per cent shall work from home.

However, he also said that the officials/staff who are working from home shall remain available on telephone and other electronic means of communications at all times.

The Minister advised all the officers and staff to ensure strict compliance of Covid-appropriate behavior like frequent washing of hands, sanitisation, wearing face mask, face cover and observing social distancing all the time.

During the interaction, the DoPT Secretary P.K. Tripathy, DARPG and Pensions Secretary V. Srinivas, Additional Secretary, DoPT Rashmi Chowdhary and other senior officials also joined virtually joined the interaction.