The
proposed indefinite strike of Central Govt. employees in protest of
"negligible increase" of salary may be deferred for some time.
National Joint Council of Action, the umbrella body of Central associations
will decide the fate of strike on Tuesday.
"They have fixed the minimum wage at a meagre Rs 18,000/- in the 7th Pay Commission. In the last Pay Commission, the basic pay was Rs 7,000/-. They multiplied it by 2.57 (fitment formula) and came to Rs 18,000/-. We are demanding 3.68 fitment formula," Shivgopal Mishra, General Secretary, All India Railway Men Federation and Convenor of National Joint Council of Action (NJCA), told IANS.
"As
many as 33 lakh government employees, excluding the defence personnel, will go
on strike if we do not get some kind of assurance from the government to
reconsider the decision. The major contention is on the minimum wage,
which we are demanding to be Rs 26,000/-," KKN Kutty, President of CCGE and
general secretary of national coordination committee of pensioners
association, told IANS.
"We
had a meeting with a group of ministers, including the Home Minister (Rajnath
Singh), Finance Minister (Arun Jaitley) and Railway Minister (Suresh Prabhu) on
the evening of June 30. They said it will be considered and will be referred to
some committee," said Mishra.
"We
are waiting to hear back on this from the government by July 4 evening or July
5. In our meeting, it was only a verbal commitment. If the government gives us
specific details like which committee will review, etc. then we will defer the
strike. We have a meeting on July 5 to decide on the strike," Kutty said.
However
while the fate of the strike is still unknown, a central government junior
staffer on the condition of anonymity told IANS: "I don't
think much will come out of the strike. The only thing the government might do
is increase the allowances slightly, that's it."
The
Bharatiya Mazdoor Sangh (BMS), affiliated to the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh,
the parent body of the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party, has also expressed its
"dissatisfaction" at the 7th Pay Commission's recommendations.
"A
huge gap has been created between the minimum and the maximum wage after the
government approved the Seventh Pay Commission Report's recommendation,"
BMS general secretary Virjesh Upadhyay told IANS earlier.However,
BMS is not expected to go on strike as it is not a part of the NJCA. The
Union Cabinet has decided to constitute three separate committees, including
one to look into the anomalies likely to arise out of enforcement of the
commission's report.
No comments:
Post a Comment