NEW DELHI: Five years after Sam Pitroda asked for a manpower audit of Prasar Bharati, Broadcast Engineering Consultants India, an institution under the I&B ministry, on Tuesday issued a tender again to scout for an agency that can carry out a “scientific and rational manpower audit to critically assess the current manpower resources of Prasar Bharati.” The notice, which allows companies to submit their forms before June 26, says the successful bidder will have to appoint a nodal officer to interact with Prasar Bharati and its units for carrying out the manpower audit and “continuously monitor the progress of the teams working on the manpower audit assignment for Prasar Bharati.” The agency will also derive a “uniform HR policy on consultants and casual assignees and determine the exact role of the deployed personnel by identifying gaps, redundancies and also look at “dying cadres or the posts that are no longer required due to changes in technology from analog to digital in radio, redundancy of analog terrestrial of TV, outsourcing, etc.” Officials said a similar tender was issued a few months ago but various applicants earlier were found lacking in skills needed for the 16- month long audit. In 2013, when Prasar Bharati had attempted to downsize the organisation, big consultants such as PWC, Boston Consulting Group and E&Y had applied. However, such attempts to reduce the strength of the broadcaster have not been successful in the past. Cutting down on manpower has been on the priorities of Prasar Bharati for several months now. While former minister Smriti Irani had asked the organisation to focus on fiscal prudence and cut down on needless expenditure, present I&B minister Rajyavardhan Rathore too had spoke about the right of the ministry to know the expenditure on salaries, without infringing on the autonomy of the organisation.