As many as 129 government officers have been forced to retire in the past few months in public interest for being non-performers, Union minister Jitendra Singh said at a press conference. The action is part of a review done by the central government to check deadwood of its workforce. "A total of 30 Group A officers and 99 Group B officers (total 129) have been sent on retirement in the past few months," he said. The punishment of compulsory retirement was given after reviewing service records of over 24,000 Group A officers and 42,251 Group B officers. He disclosed the authorities are looking into the service records of another 34,451 Group A officers and 42,521 from Group B to check the non-performers. The Centre had in January terminated a senior IAS officer on grounds of non-performance. Earlier in 2014, a graft-tainted IAS couple in Madhya Pradesh, Arvind and Tinoo Joshi, were dismissed from service, four years after an income-tax search on their house led to the detection of disproportionate assets worth Rs. 350 crore and recovery of Rs. three crore cash. A service review on a government employee is conducted twice - first after 15 years and again after 25 years of completion of qualifying service.