Punjab employees on 5-day pen-down strike, SAD says sack FM Manpreet Badal

Punjab government employees began a five-day pen-down strike from Wednesday against the recommendations of the sixth pay commission even as the Akali Dal attacked the Amarinder Singh government for “committing a fraud” on the employees and sought dismissal of Finance Minister Manpreet Badal.

‘Pay hike negligible under current formula’

Government employees, including superintendents and clerical staff, across the state will be on the pen-down strike till June 27, said Sukhchain Khera, the convener of the joint action committee of the state government employees. He said the pay commission recommendations were not acceptable to them.

The Punjab government had last week decided to implement a majority of the recommendations of its sixth pay commission with effect from January 1, 2016, a move that will benefit over five lakh serving and retired employees.

The disbursal of salaries and pensions under the new structure will begin from July 1.

The implementation would entail 2.59 times increase in salaries and pensions over the previous pay commission recommendations, with an annual increment rate of three per cent. The protesting employees have objected to the formula used in calculation of an increase in pay. “We are demanding the pay should be hiked by a multiple of 2.74,” said Khera, adding the pay hike otherwise was negligible.

Call special session to discuss matter: SAD

The Shiromani Akali Dal, meanwhile, accused the Congress government of committing a fraud on the employees in the name of sixth pay commission and demanded a special Assembly session to discuss the matter.

In a statement, senior Akali leader Bikram Singh Majithia also demanded that “all cases of injustice pointed out by employee associations be corrected within one month”. Majithia stated: “CM Amarinder Singh should explain why allowances of various categories of employees had been stopped altogether and why different categories of employees had been created in the Punjab government by enforcing the Central Pay Commission on new recruits.

The CM should also explain why thousands of contractual employees, whom he had committed to regularize five years back, were still not regularized till now”.