Senior management selection for Ordnance Factory Board PSUs already under way

NAGPUR: Amid unions protesting against corporatization, the process of selecting chairpersons and board of directors for the seven public sector undertakings (PSUs) to be carved out of the Ordnance Factory Board (OFB) has already begun.
Interviews began a week ago with 124 candidates applying. The post is open to Indian Ordnance Factories Service (IOFS) officers and senior officers from other departments. Sources said 84 candidates have already been interviewed and the process is ongoing.
The selected candidates would constitute the interim chairperson and interim board of directors. The post is open for senior officials from the department of defence production, other defence PSUs, armed forces, and controller general of defence accounts (CGDA).
The new board will do away with the existing structure of directorate general of Ordnance Factory Board (DGOFB) and members. The current DG is slated to retire in a couple of months with some of the members superannuating. The team will be replaced by chairpersons and board of directors for seven different PSUs.
The selected candidates will be put under deemed deputation to the new organization with no change in their pay and other benefits, says the order.
Even before the unions went ahead with their plans of indefinite strike, the government incorporated defence production into essential services through an ordinance. This makes the strike illegal.
The Centre of Indian Trade Unions (CITU) has filed a complaint with the International Labour Organization (ILO) against the ordinance. The CITU letter to ILO called it a “blatant violation of the workers’ fundamental right to strike and freedom of association”. The letter also cited the LO convention that workers’ representatives in all the undertakings shall enjoy effective protection from any act prejudicial to them.