Bhubaneswar: The Odisha government has asked its employees to maintain punctuality in their workplaces.

The General Administration and Public Grievance Department of the state government today issued a detailed guideline for the employees.

The state government is attaching utmost importance to punctuality, which is the primary requirement of good governance. Timely attendance in office has been one of the top priorities of the state government, said the General Administration Department.

“It is expected that all employees of the state government shall reach office within the prescribed time. This is applicable to all employees, from the junior-most to the highest government functionary,” it added.

In this context, the state government has asked all its department to install biometric attendance system in offices. The biometric data should be linked to the Biometric Attendance System Portal developed by NIC and must be analyzed by a designated officer of the department on a fortnightly basis, said the guideline.

Key points of the guideline: 

•             Every employee is expected to record his/her'Office In' as well as 'Office Out' time in the Biometric Attendance recording device. Non-recording of 'Office Out' time may be treated as absence from duty for the day.

•             Employees are expected to come to Office by the prescribed time. In Offices, where Employees are required to attend on Roster basis, the Head of Office shall issue Office Order to that effect and the time mentioned therein for reporting shall be treated as the prescribed time.

•             Delay up to a maximum span of 30 minutes, on any day with a cumulative of three days in a calendar month may be condoned by the Head of the Office or the Officer duly authorized for the purpose, thereafter, for every three days of late attendance by any employee, the employee will be liable for deduction of one day's Casual Leave from their Leave Account.

•             Considering the fact that, many employees have to work for prolonged and late hours in the evening and sometimes even on Public Holidays in the interest of office work, in such cases, the employees will be eligible for non-imposition of such penalties for late attendance, if any, with due approval of the appropriate Authority as mentioned supra.

•             In accordance with Government instructions, every employee is expected to attend Office at least for 7.30 hours (Except during days of business notified to be conducted during Morning Hours) in each working day.

•             No penalty shall be imposed for Non recording of Office In/Office Out time for any genuine reasons such as on offlcial tour, official work outside of the office premise etc. on orders by Competent Authority.

However, the employees deployed in the Secretariat of Governor, offices of the Chief Minister and other Ministers will be exempted from these instructions, said the state government.

The state government is considering the use of Artificial Intelligence (AI based cameras) and RFID based identity cards for capturing attendance data of all employees. It has been planned to introduce the same on a pilot basis in the Lok Seva Bhavan and Kharavel Bhavan in the capital city here. Later, the system shall be expanded to all government offices across the state, said the General Administration Department.