Trade unions reject 7th Pay Panel report, say actual raise is only 16%

NEW DELHI: Trade unions, including the RSS-affiliate Bharatiya Mazdoor Sangh, have slammed the Seventh Pay Commission report, saying the rise in minimum wages does not match inflation over the last 10 years and that the real overall increase in pay was much less than what was proposed.

The commission, in a 900-page report submitted to the finance minister on Thursday, had recommend 23.55% hike in salary, allowances and pension with effect from January 1 next year. It will benefit 47 lakh central government employees and 52 lakh pensioners. Major trade unions such as the Left-supported Centre of Indian Trade Unions (CITU), Congressaffiliated All India Trade Union Congress (AITUC) and BMS have opposed the report and they may now collectively take up the issue.

“We are opposing the report in totality as the real increase is just 16% and not 23.5% as is being proposed,” said,” Pawan Kumar, zonal secretary of BMS. “Besides, there is a dent in the HRA component and the report, because of its discrepancies, has widened the gap between minimum and maximum wages,” he said.

The Seventh pay Commission has proposed increasing entry-level to Rs 18,000 per month from current Rs 7,000 while the maximum pay, drawn by the cabinet secretary, has been raised to Rs 2.5 lakh per month from Rs 90,000 at present. For secretaries, it has been fixed at Rs 2.25 lakh as against Rs 80,000 now. AITUC said it’s the least hike for central government employees in the last three decades. “It is totally disappointing... least hike (proposed) during the last 30 years. Considering the inflation, it is unsatisfactory,” AITUC general secretary Gurudas Dasgupta said.

According to CITU, the commission has taken the liberty to reduce HRA and even ignored a Supreme Court judgement of 1991 in this regard.

“The report has done great injustice to workers by manipulating the figures for calculating minimum wages,” said AK Padmanabhan, CITU president.