Central Government’s Personnel Ministry has proposed 15 days in a year option and reimbursement of data expenses for work from home among others for Government employees under the draft framework for ‘Work from Home.’

All the Ministries and Departments of the Central Government have been asked to give their views on the draft by May 21. If there is no view/comment from any particular Ministry/Department, it will be taken as its agreement with the proposed draft.

According to the draft framework, it is quite likely that for the near future, the Central Secretariat will continue to go for staggered attendance and variable working hours to maintain social distancing at the workplace. Therefore, “a broad framework for Work from Home is important to standardize the operating procedure even post Lockdown situation and to ensure safety and security of information while accessing Government files and information remotely from home.”

“DOPT may provide an option for Work from Home to the eligible officers/ Staff for 15 days in a year as a matter of policy,” the draft framework said while also elaborating on necessary requirements for the new normal style of working. It has been proposed that logistic supports in the form of laptop/desktop, will be decided by the Ministries/Departments in accordance with the orders issued by the Expenditure Department’s guidelines. Ministries may use the inventory of laptops on a rotational basis for the officers who are working from home and needed such logistic support. “Department of Expenditure may consider reimbursement for data uses to the officers working from home and if required may issue separate guidelines in this regard,” draft mentioned.

Presently about 75 Ministries/ Departments are actively using the e-office platform of which 57 have achieved more than 80 per cent of their work in e- office. The remaining ones are advised to endeavour expeditious implementation of e-office in secretariat/Ministries/Departments and also in their attached and subordinate offices in a time-bound manner.

Central secretariat manual of Office Procedure (CSMoP 2019) provides for VPN to the officers at the level of Deputy Secretary and above to access the electronic files remotely on a secured network. However, Ministries/ Departments with the approval of the respective HoDs can provide VPN to the officers up to the level of Section officers based on the functional requirements in their Ministry/ Departments subject to the proper due diligence for security aspects.

Same procedure deals with the treatment of classified papers/files in e-office. However, as per instructions of the Home Ministry, no classified information will be handled through e-office, which mean such files will not be processed in e-office during work from home. “NIC (National informatic Centre) may evaluate the existing security protocol for remote access of classified file/ information in consultation with MHA and propose suitable guidelines and standard operating procedures for handling classified information in e-office. Till the time classified files shall be processed on standalone computers only,” the draft said.

E-office has the facility to link the critical files and documents for referencing in e-files. However, to enable this feature in work from the Home environment, the important files/folders/circulars must be available in the Knowledge Management System of e-office. The Ministries are therefore advised to make use of this feature in e-office so that the important documents that may be needed in examining the files are available while working from home.

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