Govt planning to give deemed deputation status to PB employees

New Delhi: Government today informed Rajya Sabha that it is planning to give Prasar Bharati employees, who had joined the public broadcaster till October 5, 2007, the status of being on deemed deputation.
Minister of State for Information and Broadcasting C M Jatua, in a written reply to a question, said, "government has proposed to amend Section 11 of Prasar Bharati Act based on recommendations of the GoM dated October 5, 2007 and September 26, 2008".
Section 11 of Prasar Bharati Act recommends that the right of taking a decision whether they want to be government employees or public broadcaster's employees, should rest with the employees of Prasar Bharati.
When Prasar Bharati was established as an autonomous corporation by an Act of Parliament, it was entrusted with the functions discharged by All India Radio and Doordarshan.
Around 40,000 odd DD and AIR employees had joined it on deemed deputation, but were not getting any facilities meant for Central Government employees.
After a prolonged agitation by workers, the GoM had recommended in September 2008 that employees recruited upto October 5, 2007 would continue to be government servants on deemed deputation to Prasar Bharati till retirement and will enjoy all facilities at par with Central Government employees.
It had further said that employees recruited after October 5, 2007 will be Prasar Bharati employees.
Accordingly, the government is in the process of amending Section 11 of the Act to implement the GoM's decision.
The minister said the government has referred to the reconstituted Group of Ministers (GoM) the issue of whether a Parliamentary committee of Prasar Bharati should be constituted as per provisions of Prasar Bharati Act.
"The issue whether a Parliamentary committee is to be constituted as per Section 13 of Prasar Bharati Act 1990 or Section 13 of the Act is to be deleted, has been referred to the GoM, which has been reconstituted on February 10, 2010 for taking a view," he said