Bihar will continue to face shortage of Indian Police Service (IPS) officers even if the Centre clears the names of 13 personnel of its state quota.

The Union Public Service Commission (UPSC) will conduct a meeting in Delhi on August 23 to clear 13 out of 39 suggested names for promotion to the IPS cadre from the state quota.

The vacancy in the IPS from the state quota would be filled up with the officers of 2011 and 2012 batches. Last time, the UPSC had cleared the names of 36 officers belonging to 2008, 2009 and 2010 batches, who were subsequently promoted to IPS cadre.

The state has a sanctioned strength of 231 IPS officers. Of them, 161 posts have to be filled up with direct recruited officers. The remaining 70 posts have been earmarked for the state service officers. Against the sanctioned strength, only 183 IPS officers are at present working. Thus, there is a shortfall of 48 IPS officers in the state. Sources in the state police headquarters said there were 17 vacancies in the state quota.

“If 13 officers of the state service are promoted to IPS, there would be only a few vacancies on this front,” a senior police officer said. He said there were five vacancies in 2011 batch and eight vacancies in 2012 batch respectively.

The government, according to rules, sent a panel of 39 officers to the UPSC for promotion recently. According to the prescribed rules, three names are recommended for promotion against each vacant post. Once the names of the officers found to be fit for promotion are given clearance by the UPSC, the ministry of home affairs issues a formal notification.

The police officer said at present, 30 IPS officers of the state were on central deputation and posted with different police organisations.