A ministry official told IANS that any employee registering three late arrivals in a month will have his or her casual leave slashed by a day.

The home ministry has nearly 5,000 employees in its offices, while the North Block headquarters alone has a strength of about 2,500 apart from security personnel who are stationed on duty.

Employees are expected to reach office at 9 a.m. sharp, and put their index finger on the scanner, which will identify their fingerprint, flash their employee code and name and register their arrival. They will have to go through the same drill when leaving for the day at 5.30 p.m.