By pruning the list of its 35 gazetted holidays, Punjab Government has declared 18 gazetted holidays for the calendar year 2018, while including the remaining in the category of restricted holidays taking the total number to 39.
With this, the State Government employees are now eligible to avail five restricted holidays instead of its previous limit of two.
Upset for excluding the Baisakhi from the list of gazetted holidays, the Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee (SGPC) has opposed its inclusion in the list of restricted holidays.
Condemning the Congress government's decision to do away with the holiday of Khalsa foundation day — Baisakhi — from the gazetted list and including it in the restricted category, SGPC president Gobind Singh Longowal demanded to include it again in gazetted holidays.
Longowal said that Sikhs’ tenth master Guru Gobind Singh had created khalsa panth on the Baisakhi day in 1699, and the Khalsa Panth celebrates this day as his birthday. “It is not fair to do away with the holiday on this day in a state which has majority of Sikh population,” said Longowal.
Citing example of Canadian Government wherein the Paliament has taken an initiative to celebrate the Khalsa's creation day (Baisakhi), SGPC chief said that the Punjab government should revise its list of holidays at the earliest by including Baisakhi in the list if gazetted holidays.
Other than that, the SGPC also demanded to once again include the martyrdom of Sikhs’ ninth master Guru Tegh Bahadur, along with the birth anniversaries of Guru Granth Sahib and Guru Ramdas in the list of gazetted holidays.
Justifying the government’s move, the spokesperson said: “The government has decided to reduce the number of gazetted holidays for 2018 to enable better public service to the citizens and also to ensure more teaching days in educational institutions. With this reform, the state government offices will remain open for 21 more days in 2018 as compared to the previous year.”
At the same time, the spokesperson said, the employees will be able to avail more restricted holidays than previously, in keeping with their preferences.
“The State Government has tried to strike a balance between its commitment to better public service, more teaching days in education institutions on the one hand, and the requirements of its employees to avail of holidays on the other...Now, the number of gazetted holidays in Punjab (only 18) are comparable to the number of holidays by the Centre which has declared 17 gazetted holidays for 2018,” added the spokesperson.
Spokesperson pointed that for 2017, the previous SAD-BJP government had declared 37 gazetted holidays and 20 restricted holidays, while the employees were allowed two restricted holidays.