Agartala: Tripura assembly on Wednesday unanimously passed an amendment bill raising 50 per cent of salaries, pensions and other benefits of the chief minister, ministers, MLA, speaker, deputy speaker, leader of the opposition, chief whip and former legislators.
The pension benefit has been extended to the MLAs who have served only one day.
Now, the salary of the chief minister has been increased to Rs 97,000, while the deputy chief minister will get Rs 96,000. Ministers, speaker, leader of the opposition and govt chief whip will draw Rs 95,000, deputy speaker will get Rs 94,000 and the salaries of MLAs will be Rs 93,000 per month.
Apart from that, chief minister will receive Rs 13,000 as a sumptuary allowance and Rs 15,000 hospitality allowance per month other than telephone allowance and house rent and perks while others will get Rs 12,000 and Rs 13,000 respectively. Each of the legislators will draw Rs 21,000 monthly as a constituency allowance and another Rs 10,000 as perks.
The pensions and family pensions of former MLAs have been increased to Rs 66,000 from Rs 34,500 and to Rs 48,000 from Rs 25,000 respectively. The ninth amendment of the bill also provided all retirement benefits, including pensions to all MLAs who have served any period.
According to the last amendment in 2022 to the salaries, allowances, pensions and other benefits of the ministers, speaker, deputy speaker, leader of the opposition, the chief whip and MLAs, an MLA would get retirement benefits including a pension if he or she served as a member of the House for at least four-and-a-half years.
However, leader of the opposition and CPM MLA Jitendra Chaudhury, while speaking on the bill before it was passed, suggested device of an administrative mechanism to review the salaries and allowances of state legislators from now on like Parliament. He said, "It sounds uncomfortable when we hear MLAs and ministers are hiking the salaries by themselves."
Parliamentary affairs minister Ratan Lal Nath said, "Salaries, pension and other benefits of Tripura legislators are lowest in the country even after these hikes. The last salary hike of MLAs and ministers was six years ago but the revision was necessitated considering the inflation, and price index."