The National Federation of Indian Railwaymen, or NFIR in short, has written to the Prime Minister seeking his intervention in the implementation of the 7th Pay Commission’s recommendations. The federation has earlier called off their plannedIndefinite Strike they had called in June last year after several senior union ministers assured them that the recommendations would soon be implemented. That promise has evidently been not borne out as theNational Joint Council of Action (NJCA) which consists of the Joint Consultative Machinery or the JCM has asked for the revision of the minimum wages of the employees of Indian Railways as well as the application of a revised multiplier factor for pay fixation. The federation currently represents over 1.3 million Railway employees.
Copies of the communique sent to the PM have also been sent to the Union Home Minister, the Finance Minister, the Rail Minister and the MoS for the Railways as well. The NFIR expressed its deep sense of disappointment over the alleged breach of commitment since, in its own words, the commitments made by the Group of Ministers which included all of the other recipients had not been honoured even after five months. It was also alleged that the agreements on several factors reached between the Railway Board and the Federation had also not been implemented. The federation stated that the non-fulfillment of assurances had led them to believe that the Government was not honouring its commitments and was not committed to resolving theirgenuine grievances either.
Since demonetisation, a lot of money has been deposited in the government’s erstwhile depleted coffers leading to increased anticipation that the 7th Pay Commission’s recommendations will be implemented soon. Outrage at the lack of implementation and the delayed grant of revised incentives have since spread, with resident doctors at Delhi’s government hospitals too threatening to go on mass leaves if the recommendations were not implemented soon. We have previously reported that theCentral Government is looking to implement the recommendations of the 7th Central Pay Commission only after the elections in five states are over, in keeping with the Model Code of Conduct.
The NFIR also requested in the same communique that other issues which were pending before various Committees constituted by the Government be cleared based on the basis of submissions made by the JCM before the concerned Committees as well as before the Cabinet Secretary. The 7th Pay Commission’s recommendations were presented by Justice A K Mathur, Chairman of the 7th Pay Commission, in November 2015. The recommendations were a 14.27% increase in basic pay while the overall hike in salary, allowances and pensions would be 23.55%. The increase in allowances will be hiked by 63% while pensions are set to rise by a substantial 24%.
