Shillong, Jan. 30: A female employee of the Meghalaya soil and water conservation department was allegedly ordered to work at the quarters of a male officer for several months instead of attending office duty.
The woman, a peon, was also asked to stay with the officer at his residence at night.
The incident came to light after the woman today circulated the petition she had sent to soil and water conservation minister Ronnie V. Lyngdoh on October 6 last year.
The woman had joined service on October 15, 2015. She was attached with the director, D. Langstieh, who, to her surprise, asked her to work at his residence as a domestic help instead of the office. After working for a few months, he asked her to stay with him at the quarters.
Being a government employee, she was paid a salary for the months she worked there.
However, after she raised questions, the director stopped her from performing household chores and wrote to a senior treasury officer here on July 27 last year, asking him to withhold her salary with effect from July 1, 2016, until further orders on the ground that the employee had not "performed her duties for the last six to seven months".
After her salary was stopped, the woman wrote to the director on September 28, 2016, requesting him to release her salary and allow her to work without staying at his residence since her house was nearby. On getting no response, she adressed the petition to the minister.
In the letter, she told the minister that she was performing her duties with utmost sincerity. She also mentioned that "in addition to my duties, the director wanted me to stay in his quarters, which is not acceptable to me and my family. Though I stay near the quarters of the director, he wants me to stay at his residence after office hours, and since I failed to comply, he issued an order to withhold my pay for two months for which I am facing financial crunch."
She also told the minister: "I report directly to the director's residence everyday and do not get chance to sign the attendance register in the office. So it reflected from the order of the director (dated July 27, 2016) that I remained absent from duty for six to seventh months. Please relieve me of night duty at his residence."
#Following her complaint to the minister, she was transferred from Shillong to the office of the joint director, soil and water conservation (research and training institute), Byrnihat, in Ri Bhoi district, on November 8 last year.
However, on November 10 she wrote to the principal secretary as well as under secretary (soil and water conservation) requesting that her transfer be put on hold since she felt it was done with "malafide intention" to inconvenience her.
She was told that there was no quarters for her at Byrnihat and that she would have to stay at the quarters of the joint director.
