Interacting with a delegation of Central Secretariat employees who called on him and sought his intervention for the timely promotion of lower grade staff members, Union Minister of State, Dr. Jitendra Singh, said that the Department of Personnel & Training (DoPT) is trying its best to clear the backlog of promotions which had accumulated for several years. The delegation also submitted a memorandum on behalf the Central Secretariat MTS Association, wherein it was submitted that many of the lowermost working professionals in the Government of India get deprived of even single promotion during their entire service tenure. Dr. Singh said to ensure objectivity in empanelments, the government has, in the last three years, improvised upon the procedures so as to ensure that there are no subjective preferences involved in promoting officers and employees. The procedures have been made more hi-tech using sophisticated technology tools to minimize the human interface, he added. The minister expressed anguish over the fact that some of the employees working in the lowest rung of administration spend their entire service tenure of 30 to 35 years without securing a single promotion. He added he has discussed the issue with senior officers in the Ministry and several innovative methods are being evolved to avoid stagnation at the middle and lower rungs of administration. He regretted that in a large number of cases, stagnation in promotions was the result of litigation amongst the employees themselves and even though the DoPT tries its best to put forward its view in the court of law, the delay becomes inevitable.