“It doesn’t come as a surprise that even bits and morsels of
information about the recommendations, which is being eagerly expected
by nearly 50 lakh employees and pensioners, make headlines.”
The recommendations of the 7th Pay Commission have slowly started to
make their way to the media in the form of unconfirmed news. The
information that was being extensively discussed by all for more than a
week now has finally made it to the websites yesterday.
It has now been confirmed that the 7th Pay Commission will submit is
report to the Government next month. With the report being given a final
shape, certain pieces of information have already started to hit the
media. Some of the workable recommendations of the commission are out.
In 2006, a number of such unconfirmed reports surfaced, when the 6th Pay
Commission report was being prepared, because the report was not
submitted to the government on time. Due to the delay, there was
tremendous curiosity to find out what the report contained. This led to a
lot of rumors. Since the internet didn’t become that popular in those
days, those rumors were hard to believe. Most of them were circulated by
word of mouth.
Now, despite the fact that there are plenty of news sources, since it
has become possible to trace the point of origin of the information,
such rumors have reduced. This time around, the information was given by
the leaders of Federations. Yet, one can neither completely accept them
as true, nor dismiss them as entirely false.
Since the government and the major employees federations have their own
websites, it has become possible for the information to spread to the
corners of the world within minutes. Also, retracts and denials too have
become equally fast, thus killing the rumours immediately. With a
number of other individual websites and blogs too covering the news
about Central Government employees, the readers are now able to
differentiate between news and rumours.
There is nothing surprising or shocking in the news reports that have
now surfaced. A minimum basic pay of Rs.21,000 is an expected one. The
recently released Kerala Pay Commission too has recommended the minimum
wage at Rs.17,000 (from 01.01.2014 onwards). The National Council has
demanded that it be Rs.26,000 per month.
It is a well known fact that the Grade Pay System had been a source of
constant irritation. The dual Hierarchy System (Promotional hierarchy
and Grade Pay hierarchy) will come to an end. There will not be any more
confusion about the promotions that come through MACP.
The Multiplication Factor of 2.86 does sound very low. NC JCM had
pressurized the Pay Commission to fix it at 3.7. The 6th Pay Commission
had fixed it at 1.86, and also given Grade Pay. Since the DA now stands
at 125% (including July 2015 and January 2016), this could end up being
substantial.