2% DA for govt staff with effect from July

CHANDIGARH: The Haryana Government has decided to give 2 per cent dearness allowance (DA) to its employees on revised pay scales with effect from July 1, putting an additional financial burden of Rs 21.92 crore per month on the state exchequer. The salary and pension bills will rise as well.

Parvesh Sharma

Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, November 24

The Haryana Government has decided to give 2 per cent dearness allowance (DA) to its employees on revised pay scales with effect from July 1, putting an additional financial burden of Rs 21.92 crore per month on the state exchequer. The salary and pension bills will rise as well.

Sources have said there are 1.83 lakh pensioners and 31,000 widows of deceased pensioners in the state. The total number of government employees is 2.76 lakh even as recruitment for thousands of posts has been going on.

“We have decided to give 2 per cent DA to employees on revised pay scales with effect from July 1. A proposal to this effect has been approved by Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar,” said Capt Abhimanyu, Finance Minister.

The minister said the instalment of DA would be paid in cash to all state government employees on the pattern of the Central government.

The government decided to give Group C and Group D employees the option to draw salary advance up to Rs 10,000 in cash, which would be adjusted in their salary for November paid in December.

The sources said the decision was likely to further fuel the salary and pension bills of the state. The salary expenses of the state had already been rising sharply.

Figures showed that the salary bill had gone up from Rs 10,615 crore in 2012-13 to Rs 15,514 crore in 2015-16. During the last six years, the bill recorded the maximum growth of Rs 2,218 crore from 2014-15 to 2015-16 as the Congress government did large-scale recruitment during the election year.

Like salary, figures showed that the pension bill of the state had been increasing every year. It increased from Rs 3,204 crore in 2011-12 to Rs 5,400 crore in 2015-16.

The annual growth of the pension bill had been between Rs 400 crore and Rs 500 crore, but implementation of the 7th Pay Commission recommendations had already increased it by more than Rs 1,000 crore.

The 6th Pay Commission salaries and pensions were given in December 2008 with effect from January 1, 2006. It had put an additional burden of Rs 5,125 crore as it included arrears for almost two years.

For implementing the 7th Pay Commission for government employees, the state government had made a provision of Rs 4,000 crore in its budget.