New Delhi: The recommendations of the Seventh Pay Commission award to review salaries of central government employees, will be implemented in April and no separate DA will be announced, Finance Ministry sources said.
Finance Minister Arun Jaitley
“The cabinet will give its nod to implement the Seventh Pay Commission award in April after some modification and it will be effective from January 1, 2016,” the sources added.
After receiving the Seventh Pay Commission report on November 19, the government had formed the implementation cell of the pay commission headed by ar Joint Secretary in Finance Ministry on November 20 last year.
With an eye on implementation of Pay Commission award, the government will not hike the dearness allowance (DA) to 1119% from existing 125%. The DA hike will be merged with the new pay as the Pay Commission made report, assuming that the rate of Dearness Allowance would be 125 percent at the time of implementation of the pay commission recommendation, i.e. on January 1.
Hence, the government has bound to implement the Seventh Pay Commission award in April, they confirmed.
The notification to put into effect the Seventh pay commission recommendation will be issued in April before the announcement of West Bengal, Assam, Kerala and Tamil Nadu states assemblies’ election in May 2016, which will benefit 50 lakh central government employees and 52 lakh pensioners including dependents, sources of Finance Ministry said Wednesday.
“The BJP led central government decided execution time of the pay commission’s award in April, which will also be possible pre-election “special packages” for West Bengal, Assam, Kerala and Tamil Nadu to win sufficient seats of states Assemblies polls, sources told our reporters.
The Seventh Pay Commission was set up by the UPA government in February 2014, The Commission headed by Justice A K Mathur submitted its 900-page final report to Finance Minister Arun Jaitley on November 19, recommending 23.55 per cent hike in salaries and allowances of Central government employees and pensioners.
The panel recommended a 14.27 per cent increase in basic pay, the lowest in 70 years. The previous 6th Pay Commission had recommended a 20 per cent hike, which the government doubled while implementing it in 2008.
The Seventh pay commission recommended fixing the highest basic salary at Rs 250,000 and the lowest at Rs 18,000and its increased the pay gap between the minimum and maximum from existing 1:12 to 1: 13.8
The government constitutes the Pay Commission almost every 10 years to revise the pay scale of its employees and pensioners, often these are adopted by states after some modifications. However, the Seventh Pay Commission suggested to discontinue the practice of appointing pay commissions in future.
