National Federation of Atomic Energy Employees
NFAEE
DEPARTMENT
OF ATOMIC ENERGY
Regn.No.17/9615
Recognised by DAE vide DAE OM No. 8/1/2007 – IR&W/95
dated 13th
June 2007
NFAEE OFFICE, Opp: NIYAMAK BHAVAN,
Anusaktinagar, Mumbai 400 094
Web site: www.nfaeehq.blogspot.com;
Email address: nfaee@yahoo.com
MEMORANDUM SUBMITTED TO
THE PRIME MINISTER OF INDIA
BY CONFEDERATION OF CENTRAL GOVERNMENT EMPLOYEES & WORKERS
Dated: 26th July 2012
To
The Honourable Prime
Minister,
Government of India
South Block, New Delhi
Dear
Sir,
More than 15,000
Central Govt. Employees from all over the country representing various
affiliates of the Confederation of Central Government employees and workers
have marched to Parliament today to present this Memorandum containing
a brief note on the 15 point Charter of demands and seek your kind
intervention in finding a settlement of these issues. The employees and workers
in all Departments of the Government of India
We,
therefore, once again request your good-self to kindly give necessary direction
to the concerned that the issues we have presented through this memorandum are
addressed immediately.
Thanking
you,
Yours
faithfully,
K.K.N. Kutty
Secretary
General.
BRIEF NOTE ON DEMANDS
Item No. 1. Revision of
wage with effect from. 1.,01..2011
The present wage
structure of the Central Govt. Employees has been made on the basis of the 6th Central Pay
Commission’s recommendations. The 6th CPC introduced a
new concept in the form of Pay band and Grade Pay. The
recommendations of the Commission were implemented with effect from 1.1.2006 in
the case of Pay and in the case of allowances with effect from 1.9.
2008. In the case of Central Public Sector undertakings, the wage
revisions normally takes place after every five years. The 5th CPC in the case
of Central Government employees recommended wage revision in every 10
years. In the past wage revision has been linked to the extent of
erosion of real wages. The degree of inflation in the economy
determines the pace of erosion of the real value of wages. The
retail prices of those commodities which go into the making of minimum wages
have risen by about 160% from 1.1.2006 to 1.1. 2011, whereas the D.A.
compensation in the case of Central Government employees on that date had been
just 51%. It is also an acknowledged fact that the 6th CPC had computed
the minimum wage by suppressing the retail price of these commodities in the
market on the specious plea that official statistics of the retail prices of
these commodities were not available. They therefore, computed the
retail price by increasing the wholesale price by 20% for each of the commodity
whereas the actual retail price in the market was 60% more than the wholesale
price. While in the case of Group B,C & D employees, the
Commission applied a multiplication factor of 1.86 for arriving at the revised
pay structure, in the case of Group A Officers, the factor was ranging from
2.36 to 3 times. In the matter of fitment formula also, unlike recommended by
the 5th CPC, the 6th CPC adopted
varying percentages whereby the officers in Group A were given rise extending
from 42 to 49%, whereas the employees in Group B,C,D were granted only 40%.
While implementing the Commission’s recommendations, the Government further
accentuated the discrimination further. The recommendations of the 6th CPC when
implemented gave rise to very many glaring anomalies. The National
Council JCM set up a National Anomaly Committee to deal with these issues which
are common to all CGEs and directed the Ministries and Departments to set up
such anomaly committees at the Departmental level to deal with department
specific issues. As has been mentioned elsewhere in this memorandum,
the effectiveness of JCM as potent forum to settle issues has been eroded over
the years by systematically tinkering with its functioning by the official
side. Though the National Anomaly Committee met 4-5 times, it could
not settle any major issues. The MACP, introduced by the Government in
replacement of the ACP Scheme already in vogue has not gone to improve the
career prospects of the employees due to various untenable stipulations made in
the order by the DOPT. The Government has refused to act upon the
Tribunal’s decision in the matter . Nor has it brought about any
settlement on this issue through bilateral discussions at the National Anomaly
Committee.
The Grameen Dak
Sewaks were excluded from the purview of the 6th Central Pay
Commission as the Postal Department took an erroneous view that they are not
Central Government employees. The 4th CPC had
categorically stated that they ought to have been included within the purview
of the Commission’s jurisdiction but chose to go by the Postal Department’s
decision ultimately. As has been mentioned elsewhere in this memorandum, the
GDS constitute the largest chunk of the Postal Workers. The
exclusion of GDS from the purview of the Pay Commission
being unjust, discriminatory and bereft of any logic, it must be
ensured that the next Pay Commission when it is set up will have the
jurisdiction to recommend on wage structure and service conditions
of the GDS.
Wage revision in all
public Sector undertakings through Collective bargaining takes place once in
five years. On the same analogy, the wage revision of the Central Government
employees must be after every five years and the Government must set up the 7th CPC immediately.
Item No. 2. Merger of DA
with pay
The wage revision
of the Central Government employees had always been through the setting up of
Pay Commissions. Since the wage revision exercise
involves inquiring into various aspects of wage determination and service
conditions of the Government employees the Government had been appointing Pay
Commissions for it was considered a better suited system of wage negotiation in
the given circumstance. Such inquiry through
setting up of Commissions had been a time consuming process. The 3rd, 4th and 5thCentral Pay Commissions
had taken more than three years to submit its report. The 6th CPC however,
submitted its report in the time frame provided to it i.e. 18
months. Since the earlier Commissions had covered many aspects of
the principles of wage determination and the periodicity of such revision had
come down, the exercise might not now require a longer period of
time as was the case earlier Even then the Commission will have to
be given a reasonable time frame to go into the matter judiciously and arrive
at conclusion. This apart, certain administrative delay cannot also
be avoided. The methodology adopted for compensating the
erosion in the real value of wages had been the merger of DA with
Pay. The 5th CPC had recommended that the DA
must be merged with pay and treated as pay for computing all allowances as and
when the percentage of Dearness compensation exceeds
50%. Accordingly even before the setting up of the 6th CPC the DA to the
extent of 50% was merged with pay. However, the Government refused to extend
the said benefit to the Grameen Dak Sewaks for no reason. Presently,
the Dearness compensation is 65% as on 1.1.2012. As on 1.1.2011, the
DA was at the rate of 50%. The suggestion for merger of DA to
partially compensate the erosion in the real wages was first mooted by the
Gadgil Committee in the post 2nd Pay Commission
period. The 3rd CPC had recommended such merger
when the Cost of Living index crosses over 272 points i.e. 72 points over and
above the base index adopted for the pay revision. In other words,
the recommendation of the 3rd CPC was to merge the DA when it
crossed 36%. The Government in the National Council JCM at the time of
negotiation initially agreed to merge 60% DA and later the whole of
the DA before the 4th CPC was set up. The 5th CPC merged 98% of
DA with pay. It is, therefore, necessary that the Government takes
steps to merge 50% of DA with pay for all purposes to compensate the erosion of
the real value of wages of the Central Government employees including the
Grameen Dak Sewaks.
Item No. 3. Compassionate appointments
On the plea of a
Supreme Court directive, Govt. introduced a 5% ceiling on the compassionate
appointments. When the matter was taken up by the Staff Side in the
National Council the Government was unable to produce any such directive from
the Supreme Court.. Despite that the official side refused to withdraw the said
instructions limiting the appointments to 5% of the available vacancies.
In one of the National Council meetings, presided over by the Cabinet Secretary
solemn assurance was given to the Staff Side for the reconsideration of the
issue in the light of the discussion, but nothing happened till date. .
It is pertinent to mention in this connection that the compassionate
appointments in the Railways continue to be operated without any such ceiling.
In the Department of Posts hundreds of compassionate appointment candidates
selected by Selection Committee were denied jobs. The list of
selected candidates was scrapped. These candidates approached the Court and
obtained a favourable order. Despite that various courts have struck
down this untenable stipulation, the Government has chosen to file SLP in the
Supreme Court. When the Central Administrative Tribunals were
established, it was with the intent of expeditious settlement of disputes on
service matters. Even recently the Government has announced that it would
not be open for various Ministries to appeal against the orders of the Tribunal
as a matter of course and efforts must be to explore the ways of acceptances of
the judgements of the Tribunal. In the light of this directive from
the Prime Minister’s office, the SLP ought to have been withdrawn. The
standing Committee on Department of Personnel in one of their report has termed
the scheme of Compassionate ground appointments as a sacred assurance to a
fresh entrant that if he dies in harness, his family shall not be left in
lurch. Such an assurance is being breached by the provisions of
limiting such appointments to 5% of DR vacancies. This
has to be done away with. We therefore urge the Honourable Prime Minister that
direction may be issued to do away with the stipulation and compassionate appointments
be given to all deserving candidates.
Item
No.4. Functioning of the JCM and implementation of the
arbitration award.
It was in the wake of
the indefinite strike action of 1960, the JCM was set up as a negotiating forum
to expedite settlement of demands and problems of employees.
On the pretext of the
promulgation of the new CCS(RSA)Rules, most of the departments suspended the
operation of the Departmental Councils. . Even after
complying with the requisite formalities, in many departments,
Associations/Federations are yet to be recognized. Wherever the
recognition process was completed and orders issued granting recognition, no
meetings of the Departmental Councils are held. Inspite of raising
the issue in the National Council on several occasions by the Staff Side,
nothing tangible has been done to ensure that the councils are made functional.
The National Council
is, as per the scheme, to meet once in four months. It meets after
several years, the system of concluding on the agenda in the meeting in which
it is raised has been totally abandoned with the result that number of issues
have been kept pending for indefinite period of time. The non-
functioning of the Council and the consequent non- redressal of grievances has
led to agitations including strike action in many departments. The 6th CPC
recommendations were given effect to in September, 2008. The anomalies
arising therefrom (which is in large numbers) ought to have been settled as per
the agreement by Feb,. 2010. Barring one or two items, no settlement
has been brought about on a large number of anomalies till date.
In the wake of the
General Strike action of the working class in the country against the neo
liberal economic policies of the Government on 28th Feb. 2012, the
Joint Secretary (Estt.) in the Department of Personnel wrote as under in her
demi-official communication addressed to all Secretaries of the Government of
India, which is contrary to facts and misleading too.
“Joint consultative
machinery for Central Government employees is already
functioning. This scheme has been introduced with the object t of
promoting harmonious relations and of securing the greatest measure of
co-operation between the Government, in its capacity as employer and the
general body of its employees in matters of common concern, and with the object
further of increasing the efficiency of the public service. The JCM
at different levels have been discussing issues brought before it for
consideration and either reaching amicable settlement or referring the matter
to the Board of Arbitration in relation to pay and allowances, weekly hours of
work and leave, wherever no amicable settlement could be reached in relation to
these items.”
The forum of
Departmental Councils must be immediately revived in all Departments and made
effective as an instrument to settle the demands of the
employees. The periodicity in which the meeting of the National
Council is to be held must be adhered. We request that the
Department of Personnel, which is the nodal department for ensuring the
functioning of the negotiating machinery is advised to monitor the functioning
of the Departmental Councils of various Ministries and Departments and a report
placed in the National Council. The Cabinet Secretary, who is the
Chairman of the National Council, may please be asked that the Council meetings
are convened once in four months and the issues raised therein settled in a
reasonable time frame. Since the grant of recognition to Service
Association is a pre requisite for the effective functioning of the negotiating
machinery, the Ministries may be asked to process the application and take
decision in the matter immediately as the recognition rules have come into
existence in 1993 that is about a decade back.
Item No. 5. Remove the
ban on recruitment and creation of posts
In 1993, the Government
of India
Since it was impossible
to carry on the functions assigned to the Departments, they had to implement
the above cited directive of the Department of personnel, which was meant to
arbitrarily reduce the manpower especially in Group C and D
segments. Though the directive was to be applied uniformly to all
cadres where direct entry is one of the mode of recruitment, not a single Group
A. post was abolished as most of the departments offered to do away with
equal number of Group C and D posts. Since direct recruitment is
seldom resorted to in Group B cadres, the brunt of the burden of the above
cited instruction had to be borne by the Group C and D cadres in each
department. The said directive remained operative for nearly a
decade i.e. upto 2010. Such abnormal and arbitrary abolition of
posts affected very adversely the functioning of many departments consequent
upon which the public at large suffered immeasurably. To cope up
with the genuine complaints of the public, most of the heads of Departments had
to resort to either outsourcing of the functions or engaging contract workers.
In the circumstances, we urge upon you to kindly direct all the Departments of
the Government of India
The Government has a
time tested and scientific system of assessing the workload and measuring the
manpower requirement on the basis of the periodical changes that takes
place from time to time. This seems to have been
presently abandoned and the vacancies except in a few cases are not being
filled up and no new posts are created, except in Group A cadres, even though
there had been phenomenal increase in the workload in each
department. The 6th CPC dealing with the subject has
recommended that such ban on creation of posts for a long period is not
desirable and the Departments should be empowered to create the need based
posts for its effective functioning. We request that commensurate
posts that are needed to cope up with the increasing workload may be sanctioned
and recruitment of personnel resorted to so that the assigned functions of each
department could be carried out effectively and efficiently. Existing vacancies
Item No.
6. Downsizing, outsourcing, contractorisation etc
Due
to the situation that came into being because of the 2001 directive
of the Government, as explained in the preceding paragraphs and due to the pursuance
of the neo- liberal economic policies, many departments had to resort to
outsourcing of its functions. Some departments were virtually closed
down and a few others were privatised or contractorised. The
large scale outsourcing and contractorisation of functions had a telling effect
on the efficacy of the Government departments. The delivery system
was adversely affected and the public at large suffered due to the inordinate
delay it caused in getting the service from the Government
departments. The financial outlay for outsourcing of functions of
each department increased enormously over the years. The quality of
work suffered. In order to ensure that the people do get a better
and efficient service from the Government departments and to raise the image of
the Government in the eyes of the common people, it is necessary that the
present scheme of outsourcing and contractorisation of
essential functions of the Government must be abandoned.
Item No. 7. Stop price rise and strengthen PDS
The abnormal and
phenomenal increase in the prices of essential commodities is an acknowledged
fact. The pursuance of the new economic policies and consequent
withdrawal of the universal public distribution system had been per se the
reason for such unbearable inflation. The universal PDS which was
evolved to protect the food security of common people was an effective
instrument not only to arrest inflation but also to ensure that no Indian dies
of hunger. Government employees even at the lowest wage structure
i.e. the Group D and C employees are presently precluded from the PDS as their
meagre wages itself is considered to be above the benchmark of “Below Poverty
Line”. They are to depend upon the open market for even
essential food items, which with their meagre income they are unable to access. It
is, therefore, necessary that the universal PDS as was in vogue must be brought
back as the market forces have failed to arrest inflation and price rise of
essential food items.
Item No. 8(a)
Regularisation of daily rated workers
Regularisation of
Casual/Contingent/daily rated workers. In most of the Departments,
as detailed elsewhere in this memorandum, the Departmental heads had to recruit
personnel on daily rated basis or as casual workers due to the ban on
recruitment to cope up with the increasing workload. Almost 25% of
the present workforce in Governmental organisations is casual workers deployed
to do the permanent and perennial nature of jobs, despite the fact that the
labour laws do not allow assigning such jobs to casual
workers. In 1950s and 1960, even the casual workers who had
been employed to do the casual and non perennial jobs used to get priority for
regular employment as and when vacancy for such permanent recruitment
arises. Thousands of persons are recruited as casual workers and kept
in the employment continuously for want of permanent hands. They are
paid pittance of a salary with no benefits like provident fund, dearness
allowance, other compensatory allowances etc. In order
to ensure that they do not get the benefit of regularisation, these workers are
technically discharged for a few days to be employed afresh
again. The modus operandi differs from one department to
another. While in some organisations, they are recruited through
employment exchanges as daily rated workers, in others the functions
are contracted out. Not only the quality of work suffers but it is
also an inhuman exploitation of the workers given the serious situation of
unemployment that exists in the country. While the permanent
solution is to sanction the necessary posts and resort to regular
recruitment, the Government should evolve a scheme by which
these casual/contingent/daily rated workers are made regular workers with all
the concomitant benefits available for regular Government employees. Pending
finalisation of such a scheme for regularisation, the non regular employees who
are recruited by the heads of departments for meeting the exigencies of work
must be paid atleast the minimum of the salary, which are paid to
the similarly placed regular employees on the basis of equal pay for equal
work.
Item No. 8(b). Absorption of GDS as regular
postal employees
The postal Department
employs the largest number of Government employees, next to Railways and
Defence. Nearly half of its workforce is called the Grameen
Dak Sewaks, the new nomenclature given for the Extra Departmental
Agents. The system of EDAs was evolved by the British Colonial
Government to sustain a postal system at a cheaper cost especially in rural
areas. Despite the enactment of very many legislation to prohibit
the exploitation of workers, the Government continued with this
system. No doubt in the post independent era, at the instance and
persuasion of the Unions of regular employees, certain benefits were accorded
to them. Till 1963, the GDS or the Extra Departmental Agents were treated as
Government employees and were covered by the service conditions applicable to
civil servants. However, the Department of Post reversed
this position thereafter and contended that they are not Central Government
employees. The Honourable Supreme Court in 1977 declared that they are holders
of Civil Posts. Justice Talwar Committee appointed by the Govt. To
look into the issues pertaining to GDS declared that the GDS are holders of
Civil posts and all benefits similar to regular employees must be extended to
them. However, the Government did not accept this recommendation of
the committee which they themselves set up. On the specific suggestion of the
Postal Department, the Government set up a separate Committee called the
Natarajamurthy Committee to go into their service conditions and suggest
improvement on the lines of the recommendations of the 6th CPC. The
recommendations of this Committee were totally disappointing and the GDS in the
post 6th CPC era is worse of. Instead of utilising the service
of GDS for the welfare schemes of the State in rural area by converting them as
regular employees, the Department caused injustice to them by acting upon the
recommendations of the Natarajamurthy Committee. Recently, the
Postal Department has decided that the vacancies in the Cadre of Postmen, and
MTS would not be fully made available for promotion to the GDS and an element
of open direct recruitment has been introduced. This has decelerated
the meagre chance of the GDS being a regular Postal employee
further. In order to ensure that their grievances are properly
addressed, the Postal Department must be directed to earmark all the existing
vacancies in the cadre of Postmen and MTS to the eligible GDS for promotion and
a scheme is evolved to absorb the GDS as regular full time Government employees
whereby all the service conditions of the Civil Servants.
Item No. 9.Introduction of PLB and removal of
ceiling limit
Barring the Railways,
Defence production units and Postal Department, Bonus is paid to the Central
Government employees on adhoc basis. The 30 days adhoc bonus is the
maximum that is provided to them. The 4thand 5th Central Pay
Commissions had recommended the introduction of productivity linked bonus
scheme to all Departments as is presently the case in the three Departments
mentioned above. Even the scheme of PLB is not uniform in as much as the Postal
Department introduced a ceiling on the entitled number of days of bonus whereas
no such ceiling exist either in the Railways or in the Defence Production
organisations. The Government is yet to implement these
recommendations even though several rounds of discussions on the subject were
held. There is no reason whatsoever, as to why this recommendation
could not be implemented. There had been no rise in the adhoc bonus
for past a decade even though there had been considerable amount of increase in
the case of PLB over the years. The Department of
Personnel and Expenditure may be advised to finalise the PLB scheme without
further delay for those who are in receipt of adhoc bonus.
Even though Bonus Act
is said to have no application or relevance to the Productivity linked Bonus or
adhoc bonus, the provisions of the said Act is employed to deny bonus to the
Government employees on the basis of their emoluments. The bonus
entitlement in both the cases is restricted to the computation based on the
notional emoluments of Rs. 3500, while the Postal Department went one step
ahead and declared that in the case of GDS, it would continue to be Rs.
2500.The injustice meted out to the GDS in the matter by the Postal Department
is highly deplorable. Presently even a casual worker is
entitled to get a monthly wage of more than Rs. 3500. The minimum
wage as on 1.1.2006 determined by the 6th CPC in respect of
Central Government employees is Rs. 7000. By
artificially linking the restriction of emoluments stipulated by the Bonus Act,
the employees are denied their legitimate entitlement of Bonus. It
is, therefore, urged that the Bonus entitlement be computed on the basis of the
actual emoluments an employee receives.
Item No. 10. Revising
OTA and Night Duty allowance rates
Overtime allowance is
seldom given to the Government employees. In case of emergency and
in the contingency in which the work cannot be postponed, like that happens in
the RMS division of Postal Department, in the Atomic Energy Commission offices
or when the Parliament is in session in other administrative offices, employees
are asked to do work beyond the stipulated working hours. The Night duty
allowance is provided to the employees who are asked to work in the night
shifts with certain stipulated conditions. The 4th CPC recommended
that since there had been considerable misuse of the provisions relating to the
grant of OTA, the Government should find alternative methods to compensate the
employees who are asked to work on over time and pending such a scheme being
evolved recommended not to revise the rates. However, the Govt.did
not bring in any new scheme of compensation but issued the directive that the
OTA and Night duty allowance will be paid to the employees who are called upon
to do overtime or night duty applicable as if the pay is not revised at
all. This directive is still in vogue. On quite a number
of occasions, the Staff Side pointed out the irrationality of the directive of
the Government in as much as a person engaged for managing the
excess work from outside gets better emoluments than the over time
allowance granted to the regular employees. The Government refused
to reach an agreement in the National Council on this issue. When
the Staff side pressed, the Government came forward to record disagreement and
refered the matter to the Board of Arbitration under the JCM.
Scheme. The Board of Arbitration having found the unreasonable
position taken by the Government gave out the award in favour of the staff and
directed the Government to revise the order whereby the allowance will be
linked to the actual pay of the Government employees. The Govt. did
not accept this award and has approached the Parliament for the rejection of
the same. The matter has not yet been placed in the form of a
resolution in the Parliament. Despite the fact that the employees
had been abiding by the directive of their superiors to be on overtime/night
duty, and despite having won the case before the Board of Arbitration they
continue to be compensated on the basis of the Notional pay as in
1986. There could not have been a much bigger injustice meted out to
the employees. We request that the Department of
Personnel/Department of Expenditure be asked to issue necessary revised
instruction in the matter in acceptance of the Board of Arbitration award
linking the allowance to the actual pay of the employee.
Item No.11. Arbitration Awards
There are about 17
awards of the Board of Arbitration given in favour of the
employees. On the plea that the implementation of these awards would
result in heavy financial outflow, the Govt. has moved resolutions in the
Parliament for the rejection of these awards. The fact is that
the financial burden on account of acceptance of these awards is
meagre. It is the delay that has been responsible for the increase
in the financial implications as the awards are to be implemented from the date
mentioned by the Board of Arbitration in their order. A few years
back, the staff side agreed to alter the date of implementation of
these awards in order to reduce the financial implication. The
official side discussed the issue on several occasions but did not conclude
with the result that these awards are still pending acceptance of the
Government. It is rather unethical and untenable that the Government
has chosen to invoke the sovereign authority of the Parliament to deny the
legitimate dues of its own employees. Prior to 1998, the Government
has not chosen to approach the Parliament once the award is given in favour of
the employees and implemented every one of them except in a very few cases. We
urge that the concerned Ministries may be advised to accept these awards and
implement the same for such a direction will bring in confidence and respect
amongst the employees over the Governmental actions.
Item No. 12.Vacate All Trade Union victimisation
The Central Government
employees are alarmed and distressed over the spree of vindictive actions
pursued by various Accountant Generals against the employees of the I A &
AD Department. More than 12000 employees have been proceeded against
under Rule 14 or 16 of the CCS (CCA) rules. The resort to such vindictive
action has been taken by the Administration of the Comptroller and Auditor
General of India for the simple reason that the employees together decided to
be on mass casual leave demanding the vacation of victimization of the Union
functionaries in Kerala, Rajkot, Gwalior, Kolkata, Nagpur, Allahabad etc. The
very fact that large number of employees participated in the Mass Casual leave
programme is indicative of the fact of the growing discontent against the
highhandedness of the Administration.
The authorities in the
IA & AD have not been permitting the genuine trade union activities for the
last several years. No meeting of the employees is allowed if the same is held
under the auspices of the recognized Associations, whereas permission to hold
cultural shows even during office hours are granted. In the name of discipline,
dissenting voice, howsoever genuine they are, are not being tolerated. Despite
repeated pleas made by the All India Audit and Accounts Association, the
Comptroller General of India did not deem it to fit to intervene and set right
the high handed behaviour of the Accountant General Kerala. On his promotion as
Principal Accountant General, he was transferred to Hyderabad
In the background of
this unprecedented situation and the blanket ban instituted by the authorities
to hold any meeting within the office premises we appeal to the Honourable
Prime Minister to kindly intervene in the matter and direct the concerned to
hear the grievances of the employees and settle the same in an amicable and
peaceful atmosphere. In order to create a conducive atmosphere for talks, the
authorities may be asked to withdraw all punitive and vindictive actions
against the employees who had gone on Mass casual leave as a means of
protesting against the inordinate delay in settling issues and to give vent to
their feeling of anger against the vindictive actions of various Accountant
Generals.
Item No. 13. Right to strike
Article 309 of the
Constitution makes it incumbent upon the Government of India India India Tamilnadu State Sovereign Republic India
Item No. 14 :Career progression
For the efficient
functioning of an institution, the primary pre-requisite is to have a contended
workforce. It is not only the emoluments, perks and privileges that
motivate an employee to give his best. They are no doubt
important. But what is more important is to provide them a
systematic career progression. The present system of career progression
available in the All India Services and the organised group A Civil services
attracts large number of young, talented and educated persons to compete in the
All India Civil Service Examination. No different was the career
progression scheme available in the subordinate services in the
past. Persons who were recruited to subordinate services were able
to climb to Managerial positions over a period of time. The
situation underwent vast changes in the last two decades. In most of
the Departments, stagnation has come to stay. It takes decades to be
promoted to the next higher grade in the hierarchy. It was the
recognition of the lack of promotional avenue in the subordinate services that
made the 5th CPC to recommend a time bound two career
progression scheme. However, this has not gone to address the
inherent problem of de-motivation that has crept in due to the high level of
stagnation. In most of the Departments, the exercise of cadre review
which was considered important was not carried out. Any attempt in
this regard was restricted to Group A services. The discontent amongst
the employees in the matter is of high magnitude today. It is,
therefore, necessary that every Department is asked to undertake to bring about
a cadre composition and recruitment pattern in such a manner that an employee
once recruited is to have five hierarchical promotions in his
career as is presently the position in the All India Services and in the
organised Group A services.
Item No.15: Scrap the New Pension Scheme
The defined benefit
scheme of pension was introduced replacing the then existing contributory
system decades back. . The Government decided to reconvert the same into
a contributory scheme on the specious plea that the outflow on pension had been
increasing year by year and is likely to cross the wage bill. By making it
contributory, the Government expenditure on this score is not likely to get
reduced for the next 36 years because of the reason that as per the
announced scheme, the Government is to contribute the same amount to the fund
as the employees contribute. Coupled with this stipulation the Government is
also duty bound to make payment for the existing pensioners and for all Central
Government employees who were in service prior to 1.1.2004. The
contribution collected from the employees who are recruited after 1.1.2004 is to
be managed by a mutual fund operator for investment in the stock
market. It is the vagaries of the stock market which will then
determine the quantum of pension or in other words annuity, which would not be
cost indexed. Before the introduction of the new scheme and the PFRDA
bill, the Government had set up a committee under the chairmanship of Shri
Bhattacharya, the then Chief Secretary of the State of Karnataka. The bill was
unfortunately drafted and presented to the Parliament disregarding even the recommendation
of the said committee to the effect that the Govt. should consider introducing
a hybrid system by which the employees will have either a defined benefit
pension or opt for a higher return through stock
exchange investments. Despite the non-passage of the bill and the
consequent absence of a valid law to support the Pension Regulatory authority,
the Govt. converted the existing pension scheme into a contributory one through
executive fiat and invested a percentage of the fund so generated from the
employees’ contribution in the Stock market. India is a young
country and the expenditure on statutory pension has remained over a long
period not more than 5% of GDP which the country/Government can afford to
spend. The withdrawal of PFRDA bill is required for the following reasons too:
(a) The new pension scheme
is going to make social security in old age uncertain and dependent on market
forces.
(b) The scheme has been
compulsorily imposed on a section of employees and hence it is discriminatory.
(c) Such scheme had been a
failure in many countries including Chile, UK and even USA. In USA
entire pension wealth has been wiped out leaving pensioners with no pension. In
Argentina the contributory scheme which was introduced at the instance of IMF
was replaced with the defined benefit pension scheme.
(d) The PFRDA Bill has
provisions empowering the Govt. and the Authority to cover employees now left
out and to amend the existing entitlements of pension benefits.
(e) In majority of the
countries, “pay as you go” is the system of
pension.
(f) The contributory scheme
does not give any guarantee for a minimum pension of 50% of the pay drawn at
the time of retirement of the employee. Nor does it provide for the
protection of his family members in the form of family pension in the event of
death.
The Supreme Court has
declared pension as one of the fundamental rights. The government should
therefore retrace from its avowed position, which is detrimental to the
interest of the employees and ensure that the employees recruited after
1.1.2004 is covered by the existing statutory defined benefit scheme and
withdraw the PFRDA bill from the Parliament.
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