Dearth of officers
In order to run the administration in Jammu and Kashmir there is shortage of officers and the government is trying to streamline the process and get the officers from outside after the merging of cadres with the rest of union territories.
Since J&K is a union territory now, the recent decision of the central government to merge the cadres was the logical move. However, it is also expected to address a key problem that the erstwhile state has been battling for decades, an acute shortage of bureaucrats.
According to the recent media reports quoting official figures, the JK cadre had a stipulated strength of 137 IAS officers but there were only 58 serving officers. Of these, at least nine are on deputation to the central government.
This shortage, therefore, threw up challenges of governance. Each officer is known to handle multiple portfolios in J&K along with violation of rules. In order to streamline the administration, the government is trying to bring more and more officers from outside so that this challenge of governance does not remain.
According to the All India Service Rules, the position of the District Magistrate in any district is a cadre post, which means it cannot be filled by a person who is not an IAS officer. But in Jammu and Kashmir such posts are being held by the people who are not IAS officers.
