Even as the Congress government already struggles to implement its five major poll promises for Karnataka owing to the financial conditions of the state, another crisis awaits the government as employees mount pressure to scrap NPS and restore the Old Pension Scheme.
The Congress party in its poll manifesto had promised to consider rollback of the New Pension Scheme and restore the Old Pension Scheme in the state for the employees who had joined before 2006.
Members of the New Pension Scheme panel on Monday met Deputy Chief Minister DK Shivakumar to discuss the restoration of the Old Pension Scheme.
Shantaram, president of the New Pension Scheme employees association, said, “We demand to scrap NPS and restore the Old Pension Scheme. He (DK Shivakumar) asked us for one or two months as he’ll discuss this with his colleagues and has called for another meeting with our organisation later. It is a preliminary stage."
While DK Shivakumar has assured of fulfilling Congress’s poll promises, but it remains inconclusive how the government will arrange sufficient funds to pay the employees in the Old Pension Scheme.
“Why are you hurrying, it’s between me and the OPS leaders and we know how to do it. In the meantime, we’ll sort it out. We’ll come out with some formula and we are on the job,” Shivakumar told News18.
At present, there are nearly 2.2 lakh government employees along with another 2 lakh employees in allied government service under the New Pension Scheme in Karnataka.
Expenditure on salary and pension would amount to about Rs 65,000 crore of a total of Rs 1.91 lakh crore revenue expenditure.
The poll promise of considering the extension of the Old Pension Scheme in the state of Karnataka was a shot in the arm for the Congress party in the run-up to the elections.
Government employees association began their ‘Vote for OPS’ campaign soon after Congress’ poll promise in support of the OPS, which in turn benefited the party’s vote share.