S P Yadav, IOFS (retd.), ex General Manager, Gun Carriage Factory, Jabalpur as chief guest inaugurated the website at Jabalpur the other day. More than 1400 officers posted across the length and breadth of the country, attended the ceremony virtually. Earlier, the Governing Body of the Indian Ordnance Factories Service Officers’ Association in light of the contemporary issues and taking into consideration the need of the hour, decided to have a common platform/link uniting the entire cadre as well as providing an outward looking approach to the cadre in the form of website. It may mentioned that post-corporatization of the Ordnance Factory Board and creation of 7 new corporations, the IOFS Officers have been placed on deemed deputation to these corporations. Notwithstanding the Government’s views on corporatization of Ordnance Factory Board, there are certain personnel issues arising out of this decision, which have raised the officers’ anxieties and concern.

 

Many apprehensions of the officers are being addressed by the concerned authorities and many apprehensions remain unaddressed. Protection of service conditions and parity with other group “A” organized services of the Government of India remains the issue of utmost priority for the association. It may be mentioned that Indian Ordnance Factories Service is an organized Group “A” Service, created by the Ministry of Defence, Government of India, with cadre controlling authority as Department of Defence Production under the provision of Article 309 of the constitution of India. The service was constituted as Indian Ordnance Service in 1935 during the British Colonial time and later was reconstituted as Indian Ordnance Factories Service (IOFS) in the year 1954.