NEW DELHI: In what it terms as a victory, Prasar Bharati has managed to appoint around 55 persons in one stroke in All India Radio (AIR) and Doordarshan.

This is the first time in 21 years that the pubcaster has been permitted such a large number of appointments in one go. The appointments, which are said to be the first batch, have come after the pubcaster struggled for three years to get clearances.

Prasar Bharati CEO Jawhar Sircar said in a tweet that the pubcaster had more than 2000 units to man and that there were over 17,000 vacancies.

The Government had told Parliament last week that 3067 of the 3452 identified as essential category posts in AIR and Doordarshan to be filled through direct recruitment have already been revived.

Another 38 middle/senior level programme posts have already been revived through deputations, Minister of State for Information and Broadcasting Rajyavardhan Rathore said.  

The Minister admitted that there are 16,764 vacancies in AIR and Doordarshan as against a sanctioned strength of 46,756. 

He said the Sam Pitroda Committee had recommended a complete manpower audit of the pubcaster and also drew up a re-deployment scheme. The Ministry had already asked Prasar Bharati to prepare an action plan in this connection, the Minister said. 

In June last year, the then I and B Minister, Prakash Javadekar, had given his clearance in principle to setting up Recruitment Boards for Prasar Bharati, and Radioandmusic.com had learnt that a total of 1154 technical posts had been cleared by the relevant selection committees.

These include programme executives, transmission executives, technicians, engineering assistants and duty officers, sources in Prasar Bharati said.

The pubcaster has not had any senior-level recruitment since it came into being in September 1997, and sources said that those posts which could not be filled out of these were held up because there is no Prasar Bharati Recruitment Board.

As of early 2013, there were 1362 vacancies in Group A, 1,584 in Group B, 4863 in Group C and 2272 in group D in AIR. In Doordarshan, 724 posts were vacant in Group A, 1140 in Group B, 2871 in Group C, and 1451 in Group D.

AIR and Doordarshan had total staff strength of 33,800 against a total sanctioned strength of 48,022, leaving a gap of 14,222 posts.

The most critically affected areas were the Programme Wing and the News Services Division (AIR)/DD News.

The Committee for Information Technology in 2012 regretted that Prasar Bharati had failed to live up to the assurance given by then Prasar Bharati Chief Executive Officer that the Recruitment Boards for Prasar Bharati would be set up by 31 March 2011.

It is understood that the Union Public Service Commission and SSC had both refused to select for a non-Governmental organisation, thus creating a new problem for the Ministry/Prasar Bharati.

The Proposal for setting up a Prasar Bharati Recruitment Board was approved by Prasar Bharati Board on 21 July 2010 and discussed in the Ministry and a final proposal was referred to the Department of Personnel and Training on 15 February 2011. DOP&T concurred with the proposal in June 2011 and the comments of the Department of Expenditure (DOE) were also received on 28 September 2011.

The DoE had requested that a separate proposal be formulated for creation of posts for the secretariat of Prasar Bharati Recruitment Board and also requested for drafting of agreement containing terms and conditions of the members of the Board. This had been done and the proposal sent to DoE in February 2012 and then to Law Ministry.