The cabinet has cleared all the recommendations of the seventh pay commission which reportedly will result in almost 23.55 percent increase in the current salaries of the government employees. Seventh Pay Commission Reccomendations Cleared and more than 1 crore government staff and pensioners will be benefited under this commission. At the lower grade the salary hike is from 7000 to 18000 rupees and at the highest level the salary has been increased from 90000 rupees to 2,50,000 rupees. This has led to an additional expenditure on 1 lakh, 2000 crore for the government in the year 2016-17. Let us tell you some important points about the 7th pay commission:
- The rate of annual increment has been retained at 3%.
- One rank one pension has also been proposed for civilian government employees on line of OROP for armed forces.
- Ceiling of gratuity has been enhanced from rupees 10 lakh to rupees 20 lakh and ceiling on gratuity has been raised by 25% whenever DA rises by 50%.
- Cabinet secretary to get rupees 2.5 lakh as against rupees 90000 per month pay band currently.
- Financial impact of implementing recommendations will be rupees 1.2 lakh crore. Out of which rupees 73650 crore to be borne by the central budget and rupees 28450 crores to be borne by the railway budget.
- Total impact of commission’s recommendations to raise the ratio of expenditure on salary and wages to GDP by 0.65% points to 0.7%.
- Military Services Pay (MSP) which is a compensation for the various aspects of military service will be admissible to the defence forces personnel only.
- Commission recommended abolishing 52 allowances; another 36 allowances subsumed in existing allowances or in newly proposed allowances.
- The commission also recommended the house rent allowance to be paid at the rate of 24%, 16% and 8% respectively for the class X, Y, and Z of the new basic pay.
SN Malik, press secretary at the National Federation of Indian Railwaymen (NFIR), said, “The Seventh pay commission recommendations are totally against the expectations of employees and the government has not taken a serious view on modifying the recommendations so far.”
Also, Shiv Gopal Mishra, convener of the National Joint Council of Action in his statement said, “Two of the most significant issues that have triggered the strike action are the inordinate delay in taking decisions on the pay commission recommendations and the refusal of the government to bring back the old statutory defined benefit scheme of pension to all employees in place of the contributory pension scheme.”
The recommendations will be implemented from 1st January 2016.
