Thiruvananthapuram: Regional offices of the Accountant General in Kerala, which are, as per the Constitution of India, responsible for auditing the Government’s monetary transactions and approving the salary and pension of State Government employees are on the verge of closure.

As a prequel, the number of staff has been cut down in these offices. As of now, the regional offices at Kottayam and Kozhikode have been ordered to close down. Since the offices at Ernakulam and Thrissur have Deputy AG posts, these will continue their operations. The designed action plan is to reduce the staff at the regional offices and concentrate operations at the headquarters in Thiruvananthapuram.

The reduced number of employees

•Thrissur: 260 to 30

•Ernakulam:100 to 20

•Kozhikode: 120 to 30

•Kottayam:100 to 15

The AG is the state representative of the Controller and Accountant General (CAG). AG is the final decision maker on the salaries, promotions, and pension of the Government employees. Many irregularities in government projects have been uncovered through the AG report.

PF withdrawal to face delay

As mentioned earlier, the AG is the state representative of the Comptroller and Accountant General (CAG) and has the final say on the salaries, promotions, and pensions of government employees. The AG's approval is mandatory for loans from PF and withdrawal of PF money upon retirement.

With the reduction in staff in the regional offices, all the files are being transferred to the headquarters in Thiruvananthapuram. With the workload there, the file movement has started to drag on which delays the whole procedure of monetary transactions at the Government level.