To express their unhappiness, personnel of the three services have decided to withhold the implementation of Sixth Pay Commission’s recommendations which were to come into effect from October 01.
“It is quite a serious matter. We can’t just accept something half-hearted like this. In fact, there were too some anomalies in the 5th Pay Commission recommendation for the Armed forces which are yet to be resolved,” said former Army Chief General VP Mallik.
"The Armed Forces have not raised their pay vouchers in the revised scales in accordance with the CPC notification and have submitted bills in the old pay scales," a Defence Ministry source said in New Delhi.
Yesterday, the government agreed in principle the Services' demand for restoring 70 per cent "extant pensionary weightage" to jawans on the basis of their last drawn pay.
But the Armed Forces are cut up with the Finance Ministry over the rejection of their three other demands concerning officers.
The CPC had recommended that the jawans be given 50 per cent "pensionary weightage" and provided an option of lateral entry into paramilitary and central police forces.
The Armed Forces wanted the lateral entry scheme to be first approved and implemented by the government before the CPC recommendation on the 50 per cent "pensionary weightage" came into effect.
"We have accepted salaries this month under the old pay scales, as we expect the government to take a quick decision on all our demands soon after Prime Minister Manmohan Singh returns from his US visit on October 1," a defence officer said.
In effect, over 50 lakh civilian government employees will take home higher pay packets along with the arrears announced in the CPC this month, but the 13-lakh-strong Armed Forces personnel would reconcile with the old salaries, to send a strong message to the government.
Defence Minister AK Antony and the three Services chiefs have already represented to the prime minister on the four "core issues" they have with the CPC notification.
Navy chief Admiral Sureesh Mehta and Army chief General Deepak Kapoor met Cabinet Secretary K M Chandrasekhar and PMO officials yesterday to apprise him of the "anger" among the 70,000 officers over their demands not finding favour with the bureaucracy.
They have also requested the country's top political leadership to decide on their CPC demands and to implement the pay commission notification in abeyance till the issues were resolved.
"It is just a matter of less than Rs 450 crore annually if the government accepts the four demands of the Armed Forces, which is not a huge burden on the exchequer," an officer said.
Among the other demands were placing Lt Colonels and their equivalents in the Navy and Air Force under Pay Band-4 instead of Pay Band-3, Grade Pay to officers from Captain to Brigadiers on par with their civilian counterparts, and placing Lt Generals in the Higher Administrative Grade (HAG) Plus pay scales as the Director Generals of paramilitary and police forces.
Source Zee News.
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entral govt employees’ retirement age to be extended by 2 years to 62 - Financial Express
The government is planning to extend the retirement age of all central government employees by two years — from the current 60 to 62 years. Sources said that an in-principle decision has been taken in this regard and the department of personnel and training (DoPT) has begun the work to implement the same. A formal announcement to this effect is expected this year itself.
The last time the government extended the retirement age of central government employees was in 1998. It was also a two-year extension from 58. This was preceded by the implementation of the 5th Pay Commission, which had put severe strain on government’s finances. Subsequently, all state governments followed the Centre’s policy by extending the retirement age by two years. Public sector undertakings followed suit too.
The decision to extend the retirement age is well-timed both politically and economically.
The UPA government reckons the move would be a masterstroke. At a time when it is buffeted by several corruption cases, it is felt that the extension of the retirement age will go down well with the middle classes. Economically also, the move makes sense because by deferring payment of lump sum retirement benefits for a large number of employees by two years, the government would be able to manage its finances better.
“An in-principle decision has been taken to increase the retirement age by two years within this year itself. This would reduce the burden on the fisc from one-time payment of retirement benefits for employees including defence and railways personnel,” an official involved in the discussion said. With the fiscal consolidation high on the government's agenda, this deferment would come handy.
There’s some flip side too if the retirement age is extended by two years. Those officials empanelled as secretaries and joint secretaries would have to wait longer to actually get the posts. And of course, there is the issue of average age profile of the civil servants being turning north.
It is also felt that any extension is not being fair with a bulk of people who still look for jobs in the government.
However, officials point out that at least it prevents an influential section of the bureaucracy to hanker for post-retirement jobs with the government like chairmanship of regulatory bodies or tribunals.
“As it is, a sizeable section of senior civil servants work for three to five years after the retirement in some capacity or the other in the government,” said a senior government official. The retirement age of college teachers and judges are also beyond 60.
As per a study, the future pension outgo for the existing Central and State government employees is estimated at a staggering Rs 1,735,527 crore or 55.88% of GDP at market prices of 2004-05.
Source: www.financialexpress.com
[http://www.financialexpress.com/news/central-govt-employees-retirement-age-to-be-extended-by-2-years-to-62/784342]
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