At present, the eyes of the central government employees and pensioners are completely focused on the 8th Pay Commission. Nearly 10 months have passed since the formation of the commission and now it has only 8 months left to prepare its final recommendations. When the government constituted this commission in November last year, it was given a time limit of 18 months. In such a situation, the big question arising is that how far has the work of the Commission reached in these 10 months and what is going to come in the hands of the employees?
Actually, the Commission is currently on a tour of states and union territories. Frequent meetings are being held to understand the ground reality and to communicate directly with the employee unions. Recently, an important meeting of the Commission was held in Chandigarh between 16th and 18th September. Earlier, the Commission has held discussions with various stakeholders in big cities like Delhi, Lucknow, Bhubaneswar, Kolkata, Jammu, Chennai and Puducherry. This series of meetings has not stopped yet. The next big meeting is proposed in Bengaluru on October 7 and 8, after which visits to some other states are also scheduled.
Most of the criticism on fitment factor in 8th Pay Commission
The most important aspect that has emerged from all these meetings is the fitment factor. In almost every state, central employees organizations and pensioners associations have insisted on keeping the fitment factor as high as possible. Some employee organizations have made a strong demand to take the fitment factor closer to 4 this time.
If we understand in simple words, the fitment factor is the formula by which the basic salary of the employees is decided. The higher the fitment factor, the bigger will be the increase in the in-hand and basic salaries of the employees. For example, if the Commission fixes a fitment factor of 2, then the current minimum basic salary of a Level-1 employee whose current minimum basic salary is Rs 18,000 will directly double to Rs 36,000. If this factor reaches close to 3 or 4, then this figure of salary increase can prove to be historic for the employees.
Demand to merge DA into basic and changes in HRA
During the meetings, some interesting and big proposals regarding Dearness Allowance (DA) have also been put before the Commission. The organizations have raised the demand that whenever DA reaches the 25 percent mark, it should be immediately merged into the basic pay. However, there is no such provision in the existing rules. At present the situation is that the DA of the employees has reached the level of 60 percent of the basic pay. Along with this, the organizations have also asked the Commission to calculate DA on the basis of data of every 6 months instead of the average of 12 months, so that the impact of rising inflation can be reduced immediately.
The second major concern is that of entry-level employees. Unions argue that the existing House Rent Allowance (HRA) in metros like Delhi, Mumbai, Bengaluru is proving inadequate. Therefore, HRA of entry level employees should be increased and a separate new pay level should be created by including lower level employees. Apart from this, the voice of increasing the family unit from the current number to 5 in the salary determination formula is also being raised continuously.
The Commission is now running out of time rapidly. Within just 8 months, it will have to submit its final report to the Central Government, balancing all these suggestions received from across the country, financial data and the burden on the government treasury. Now it remains to be seen how many of these huge demands of the employees the Commission gives its approval to.