7th CPC, Merger of DA, Scrap NPS etc. demands of Central Government Employees: Explanatory Note on Demands by Confederation
Demands of CG Employees : Revision of wage with effect from. 1.,01.2011 and Merger of DA with pay…etc.,
CONFEDERATION OF CENTRAL GOVERNMENT EMPLOYEES AND WORKERS
North Avenue Post office, Firstg floor
New Delhi. 110 001.
Website: confederationhq. Blogspot.com.
E mail:confederation06@yahoo.co.in.
Dated: 4th Feb. 2014.
EXPLANATORY 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. They were assured
to be looked into and settled through negotiations in the JCM. The
effectiveness of JCM as a potent forum to settle issues has been eroded
over the years. Thus, though the National Anomaly Committee met 4-5
times, it could not settle any major issues.
The minimum wage
determined by the 6th CPC was at a far lesser amount than what an
unskilled worker is entitled to. Morevoer, the Commission assigned the
so determined minimum wage to be the wage of a skilled worker.. It
excluded persons below matriculation qualification from the purview of
Government employment. In a country where one third people are
illiterate, such controversial recommendations have only gone to absolve
the State from its solemn responsibility to provide employment to the
persons at the lower strata of the society. The wage structure evolved
by the 6th CPC deviated drastically from the concepts emerged from the
deliberations over decades in the matter of wage determination of civil
servants and is beset with innumerable anomalies necessitating a
thorough overhaul , which can only be attempted by setting up another
Commission with appropriate terms of reference.
The Gramin 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. 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, the next Pay
Commission when it is set up must 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 therefore 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. Such inquiry through setting up of Commissions had been a
time consuming process. The 3rd, 4th and 5th Central Pay Commissions
had taken more than three years to submit their reports. 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 for the
6th CPC recommendations when implemented has given rise to large number
of anomalies and cadre related grievances. The methodology adopted for
compensating the erosion in the real value of wages in the in the
interregnum period had always been though the mechanism of merger of a
portion of DA.
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. It is pertinent to mention that even this benefit
was denied to the GDS. As on 1.1.201, the Dearness compensation was 65%
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 crossed 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 atleast
50% of DA with pay to compensate the erosion of the real value of wages
immediately.
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 direction of 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 that the issue will be revisited in the light
of the discussion, but nothing happened thereafter. 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 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. But the Court directive was not acted upon. The
Government has chosen to dilly dally by filing 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 Prime Minister’s office ordered 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, 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 vacancies. This condition,
therefore, must be done away with.
Item No. 4(a). 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
legislations 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 areas
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.
Item No. 4(b) Regularisation of daily rated workers.
Regularisation of Casual/Contingent/daily rated workers.
Due
to the ban on creation of posts and recruitment of personnel that
continued for a very long period and the consequent strain on the
existing workers, many Departmental heads had to recruit personnel on
daily rated basis or as casual workers. Thus, almost 25% of the present
workforce in Governmental organisations are casual workers deployed to
do the permanent and perennial nature of jobs, contrary to the
prohibition of such unfair labour practices by the law of the land. In
Fifties and Sixties, 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 now recruited as casual workers and kept as
such for years together.
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 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 recruited for meeting the exigencies of work must be
paid pro-rata salary on par with the similarly placed regular employees
on the principle of equal pay for equal work.
Item No.5. Functioning of the JCM.
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 on 28th Feb. 2012, the Joint
Secretary (Estt.) in the Department of Personnel wrote in her
demi-official communication addressed to all Secretaries of the
Government of India as under, which is contrary to facts but also
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. The Department of Personnel, which is the nodal department for
ensuring the functioning of the negotiating machinery must 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, is required to
ensure 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
must be asked to process the application and take decision in the matter
within a fixed time frame as the recognition rules have come into
existence in 1993 that is about a decade back.
Item No. 6. Remove the ban on recruitment and creation of posts
In
1993, the Government of India introduced a total and blanket ban on
creation of posts. This was with a view to reduce the manpower in the
Governmental establishments, for on implementation of the neo liberal
economic policies, the Government will be required to close down some of
its activities and some others to be shifted to the private domain. In
2001, the GOI issued an executive instruction modifying the complete
ban on recruitment that was in vogue whereby various departments, if
they so desire, resort to recruit personnel to fill up the existing
vacancies, provided they abolish 2/3rd of such vacancies. In other
words, the concerned heads of Departments will be permitted to fill up
1/3rd of the vacancies provided they abolish the 2/3rd vacancies
permanently.
Since it was impossible to carry on the functions
assigned to the Departments with large number of vacant posts, 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 Group C and D posts even in the place of require Gr.A
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 b y 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, besides accentuating the unemployment
situation to alarming proportion. 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.
The Govt. encouraged this endeavour by providing unlimited funds. In the
circumstances, it is imperative that the sanctioned Strength as on
1.01.2001 is restored and the consequent vacancies filled up by a
special drive for recruitment.
The Government has a time tested
and scientific system of assessing the workload and measuring the
manpower requirement. This seems to have been presently abandoned and
the vacancies barring in a few cases are not being filled up. Even
though there had been phenomenal increase in the workload in each
department no new posts are created to cope up with the situation. 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. The commensurate posts that are needed to cope up with the
increasing workload must be sanctioned and recruitment of personnel
resorted to so that the assigned functions of each department could be
carried out effectively and efficiently.
Item No. 7. Downsizing, outsourcing, contractorisation etc.
To
overcome the difficulties emanated from the total ban on recruitment
and creation of posts and more specifically impacted by the 2001
executive fiat of the Govt. of India in the matter, many departments had
to resort to outsourcing of its functions. Some 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 requisite service.. 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 employees 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.The practice of
outsourcing and contractorisation is nothing but a cruel exploitation
of the alarming situation of unemployment. The system of outsourcing
of the functions seeks to informalise the workforce. The
contract/casual workers get not even one third of the salary of the
regular work force. They have no social security benefits like pension,
provident fund gratuity etc. The CG employees fought against the
temporary service rules which was in vogue in sixties and ensured that
the recruitment to Government service is permanent and the civil
servants are not allowed to be fired at the whim and fancy of their
bosses. The outsourcing and contractorisation has paved way for large
scale entry of casual workers and has resulted in the reversal of what
all achieved in this direction through struggles in the past two
decades.
Item No. 8. 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. 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 the entitled
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. The Bonus
entitlement must be computed on the basis of the actual emoluments of an
employee.
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 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 on the basis of the 4th CPC pay
structure. 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. The Government must accept the
award of the Board and issue instructions 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.
The figures quoted by the official side included the arrears that have
become due to the delay in taking decisions. The financial implication
is normally computed as a total outlay for a period of a year. The
official side has in fact only tried to mislead the Parliament in order
to obtain a rejection of the award. 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. The Government must accept these awards and implement the same
for such a direction will bring in confidence in the efficacy of the
negotiating forum and a sense of reasonableness in the decision making
process.
Item No. 12. Right to strike
Article
309 of the Constitution makes it incumbent upon the Government of India
and the Provincial Governments to make enactments to regulate the
service conditions of the civil servants. However, till date no such
enactment has either been moved or passed by the Parliament.. The
transitory provisions empowering the President of India to make rules
till such time the enactment is made has been employed to regulate the
service conditions of the Government employees. Once recruited as an
employee, the ILO’s conventions provide all trade union rights. India
is a signatory to those conventions. Despite all these legal and moral
obligations on the part of the Government, the Government employees
continue to be denied the right to collective bargaining. No
negotiation is worth the meaning, if the employees have no right to
withdraw their labour in case of a non-satisfactory agreement on their
demands. It is this legal lacuna which was employed by the Supreme
Court to justify the arbitrary dismissal of lakhs of employees by the
Tamilnadu State Government when they resorted to strike action. In the
judgment delivered by the Supreme Court, it was observed that the
Government employees do not have any legal, fundamental or moral right
to resort to strike action. The entire section of the Indian Working
Class enjoys the right to strike and an effective collective bargaining
system except the Government employees. The denial of the right to
strike to Government employees was employed by the British Colonial
Rulers as part of the scheme to subjugate the Indian people and to shut
out any probable dissenting views within the Governmental machinery.
To continue with the same concept is to infer that the Sovereign
Republic of India want to follow the archaic rules and regulations
conceived by colonial rulers perhaps with the same intent. We therefore
urge that necessary legislation affording the right to strike to
Government employees may be made in the Parliament.
Item No. 13 :Career progression: Grant five promotion in the service career.
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.14: 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
four decades because of the reason that as per the announced scheme,
the Government is to contribute the same amount to the fund as the
employees make. 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 solid
reasons:
(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 had 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.
The
recent decision of the Cabinet to allow FDI in pension fund operations
has made the real intent of the PFRDA bill unambiguously clear. The FDI
will facilitate the mutual fund operators to invest the funds outside
India thereby making Indian Savings available for development of a
foreign country. It is now clear that the decision behind the
contributory pension scheme was the pressure imposed by imperialist
powers and more specifically IMF. It has, therefore, to be opposed at
all cost and with vehemence. The Govt. must not be allowed to go ahead
with its intention of induction of FDI in pension fund companies. The
one day strike on 12th December, 2012 must be seen as a beginning of the
sustained and incessant struggles in the days to come.
Item No. 15.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, is 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, where, as per the report, he has continued with his
intolerant attitude towards the Association. Permission to hold the
General Body meeting, a constitutional requirement and a necessity to
abide by the stipulations made by the CCS (RSA) Rules, 1993, was denied
to the recognized Association in Andhra Pradesh. The General Secretary
and other office bearers of the Association have been proceeded against
under Rule 16 for holding the General Body meeting during lunch break.
In
the background of this unprecedented situation and the blanket ban
instituted by the authorities to hold any meeting within the office
premises we appealed to the Honourable Prime Minister to 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. We
also requested that 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. Not only no action
has been initiated by the C&AG in this direction but the vindictive
attitude of the Accountat Generals continue to persist. The Government
is required to interfere and bring about a peaceful atmosphere in this
prestigious institution.
Source: www.confederationhq.blogspot.in
[http://confederationhq.blogspot.in/2014/02/2014-february-12-th-13-th-48-hours.html]
