DA/DR of more than one crore employees and pensioners in the Central Government has been increased by four percent. The rate of dearness allowance has now become 50 percent. However, the government did not say anything regarding the arrears of 18 percent ‘DA’ withheld during the Corona period. The issue was raised by C. Sreekumar, General Secretary, All India Defense Employees Federation (AIDEF), at the National Council (JCM) staff side meeting last year. Representing the staff side, Sreekumar had urged the Secretary (P), DoPT, that the arrears of ‘DA’ of 18 months is the right of the employees. Arrears of DA/DR should be released to employees and pensioners. During the Corona period, the Central Government had saved Rs 34,402.32 crore by stopping the said payment to the employees. SC Maheshwari, General Secretary of ‘Bharat Pensioner Samaj’ has also requested the government to release the arrears of 18 months of DA stopped during the Corona period.
The report was given to the Finance Ministry
The issue of DA arrears has been raised many times before. Senior member of ‘National Joint Council of Action’ (NJCA) and General Secretary of All India Defense Employees Federation (AIDEF) C. Sreekumar said that issues related to the interests of the personnel, including restoration of old pension and many other demands, were continuously raised. Are going. Along with all this, the fight for payment of 18 months DA/DR that was stopped during the Corona period is also going on. The Cabinet Secretary has already been written to by the ‘Staff Side’ National Council (JCM) for payment of 18 months’ DA arrears. A report in this regard has also been given to the Finance Ministry. The Central Government has also cited the decision of the Supreme Court.
This argument given by the Central Government
Central government employees and pensioners have been demanding for a long time the payment of 18 months of DA arrears that were stopped during the Corona period. The Central Government had admitted in the budget session that applications had been received from many employee organizations for releasing the outstanding amount of DA. However, instead of giving any concrete assurance in this regard, the government clearly said that in the current circumstances it is not practical to release the arrears of DA. Meaning, the Central Government will not pay DA/DR amount of more than Rs. 34 thousand crores to its employees. During the budget session, Minister of State for Finance Pankaj Choudhary had said, the fiscal deficit of the central government is still running more than double the level shown in the FRBM Act. In such a situation, it is not possible to pay arrears of DA/DR. C. Sreekumar explains, the Supreme Court has decided that in such cases the employee has to pay the amount with six percent interest.
DA payment was stopped during the Corona period
The central government had stopped 3 installments of dearness allowance and dearness relief for 18 months from January 2020 to June 2021 during the Corona period. At that time the government had said that the economic situation was not good. National Council of Ministers (JCM) Secretary Shiv Gopal Mishra had then raised the issue in a meeting with the Cabinet Secretary. The workers were hopeful that they would get the due amount, but the central government rejected it outright. According to C. Sreekumar, the government has lost its mind. In the beginning of 2020, under the pretext of Covid-19, the Center had banned DA/DR of government employees and pensioners. At that time, the central government had saved crores of rupees by stopping the payment of 11 percent DA of the employees. After that, representatives of employee organizations had suggested various options to the government regarding payment of 18 months’ arrears. These also included making lump sum payment of arrears.
This is the meaning of the government’s announcement
After the Corona period, Union Minister Anurag Thakur had announced that employees will get dearness allowance at the rate of 28 percent. At that time he did not say anything about arrears. The announcement of the Union Minister meant that the increased DA rate should be considered as 28 percent from July 1, 2021. According to this, there was a sudden increase of 11 percent in DA between June 2021 and July 2021, whereas no increase in DA rates was recorded in the period of one and a half years. DA/DR was frozen from January 1, 2020 to July 1, 2021. During the Corona transition period, three installments of DA (January 1, 2020, July 1, 2020, January 1, 2021) were stopped. After this, the government reinstated dearness allowance in July 2021. Then the government became silent on paying the remaining three installments of 18 months.
News source : अमर उजाला
