The first meeting of the National
Anomaly Committee was held on 17.07.18 under the Chairmanship of Shri
Chandramouli, Secretary, Personnel, Govt. of India, Ministry of Personnel and
Public Grievances. As a member of the Standing Committee of the NC
JCM Staff Side the undersigned had participated in the
deliberations. The Staff Side had critically examined the items
before the same was processed for inclusion. There had been
correspondence between the Staff Side and the Official side as to the
admissibility of items in the meeting. It was clear that the driving
force behind the Government’s decision had more often been their willingness or
otherwise to agree to the demand on merit of the case. Therefore,
while they admitted almost all items concerning the difficulties that arose out
of the decision of ignoring the 3% criterion for increment, (as in many cases
it had resulted in less than 3%), as a matter of gratis, the very
item which questioned the wisdom of rounding off to the nearest rather
than the next was considered not as an anomaly. Initially
the Department of Personnel took the untenable stand that items pertaining to
Pension cannot be included as an agenda in the Anomaly committee, for according
to them pension was beyond its purview. Accordingly, the two items, i.e.
Minimum pension and Option No. 1, which the Staff Side had introduced on our
request, was not considered at all. This was the stand taken by the
Joint Secretary (Estt) during his interaction with the Staff Side. In
the preliminary meeting that was held months back, the Official side had agreed
to re-examine their stand on the force of the arguments placed by the Staff
Side. That was how the official minutes of the meeting had indicated
against many of the items. It was therefore, surprising that the Official Side
intimated the Staff Side only in the late hours of 16thJuly, 2017,
that they would be taking up six items for discussion at the meeting
convened for 17th. The Staff Side did discuss the
said issue and the way in which the meetings are convened and agenda papers
were circulated. At the insistence of the Staff Side, the Official side had to
agree to part with the reasoning they have for non-inclusion of the rest of the
items (Other than 6) for discussion. It is however, certain that
there is hardly any possibility of the Official side conceding any of the
issue, irrespective of the fact that very many of them are clear cut anomaly
and requires to be addressed. It could be seen that the type of
anomalies that had arisen after the 6thand 7th CPC
were the product of the top bureaucrats in the respective Pay Commissions to
garner benefits only for them at the cost of the lower level
functionaries. Most of the other difficulties were due to the
lack of sufficient time at the disposal of the Commission and the Government’s
intervention at the last minute over the computation of Minimum wage.
Reverting
to the two items concerning the pensioners, viz. the computation of Minimum
Pension by the 7thCPC and the rejection of Option No.
1, from the reports we receive at the CHQ it is clear that
more and more Number of Pensioners have started realising the complexity of the
Pension welfare department over the Government’s decision. . In the
case of Minimum pension, we have not gone into the right or wrong of the
computation of the Minimum wage though it will have a cascading impact on the
very question of the Minimum pension. Unless the Minimum wage is altered on the
force of the trade union action by the working employees, the possibility of
the cascading impact would not arise. What we are however, pointing
out is the arbitrary manner in which the minimum pension is reduced to 50% of
the Minimum wage. While the principle that nobody can exist without a minimum
wage including the pensioner, rather more so by the pensioner, has
the incontrovertible position, at the Anomaly Committee our point is
that it must be not less than 60% of the minimum wage as the
worker’s family consisting of three units, whereas pensioner family
has 1.8 units. In the case of Option No. 1., there had been
confusion galore at the initial stages. It is now clear that
somebody at the top wanted the parity question to be settled in the manner the
5thCPC had recommended and that would have only been possible if the
Option No. 1 is rejected. It has been interpreted in such
a manner that the computation would become difficult without certain records,
which are unavailable. Though both the arguments were demolished, the Committee
submitted its report to the Government with the conclusion that the
implementation of the said recommendation was not feasible. The
argument that the Service Records of an individual pensioner was not need to
act upon the option No.1 was totally glossed over. However, they had
to admit that in 86% of the cases, the requisite records were
available. Even then the Committee suggested for its
non-acceptance. The most reasonable position taken by the Staff Side
to have three options was also rejected. There is no history, where
the Government has accepted any suggestion made by the pensioners, their
organisations, the JCM Staff side in the past in respect of Pension and Pension
fixation. They were dragged to the Court not once but on many
occasions. The classic example was on the question of the “modified
parity” The Courts struck down the argument of
the Govt. There had been no grace on the part of the Government to
accept the verdict. They dragged the Pensioners upto the
level of the Supreme Court. Even after the Supreme Court verdict,
they had the cheek to suggest that the benefit should be imparted only for the
litigants. We do not, therefore, pin any hope over the deliberations
that might take place in all these fora. It is our experience that
the JCM forum was used by the Govt. as vehicles for dilly
dallying. But we are to take part in these exercises for the sheer
requirement of exposing the attitude of the Government and the top bureaucrats,
which controls it. We have no idea when the next meeting would be
convened or convened at all.
With greetings,
Yours fraternally,
Sd/-
K.K.N. Kutty.
Secretary General.
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