Bruhaspati Samal
Secretary, AIPEU,
Group-C
Bhubaneswar Division
While travelling up above the world so
high enjoying the beauty of the blue sky, passing through the moving clouds,
observing the magnetism of the green earth with panoramic rivers, hills and mountains
sheltering exotic flora and fauna, Mr. Mohapatra became very emotional. Oh, the
veritable paradise !Tears of joy rolled down from his eyes. For the first time
in his life he availed flight travel to Jammu & Kashmir under Leave Travel
Concession (LTC) which was completely
unimaginable for him.
He told his wife and children, “My
Department sanctioned me Rs.88000/-
interest free advance for which I could be able to offer this facility to you
all. Otherwise, a low paid employee like me had no hope to avail flight travel
to J& K.”
Immediately his 17 year old son told,
“ Dad, now our Hon’ble Prime Minister has also been very much generous towards the
Central Govt. employees. Soon LTC will be extended to SAARC countries. Do you
know?”
“Yes” - Replied Mr.Mohapatra.
“Then next time we must visit to Sri
Lanka” – Proposed his 12 year old daughter.
“Oh ! Sure.” – Promised Mr.M ohapatra
passionately with the decision to show his family at least one foreign country
before retirement.”
Similar promises were made by so many Central
Govt. employees to their family members.
Mr. A K Jena and Mr. R K Mohapatra,
Postmen staff who were earlier working as Grameen Dak Sewak and never dreamt of
availing such a facility, did avail LTC soon after completion of one year as
Departmental employee and visited Jammu & Kashmir with their family members
in a most delightful manner in flight taking 90% advance from the Department.
Similar is the case of such low paid employees like Mr. Mohanty and Mr.Routray who
travelled to Andaman & Nicober Islands taking Rs.75000/- each interest free
advance and Mr. Pattnaik and Mr. Dash who
availed the facility to North East India with their family members with
Rs.60000/- advance each under LTC.
At the time of submitting the
Memorandum to 7th Central Pay Commission on common issues concerning
all Central Govt. employees, the Confederation of Central Govt. Employees and
Worker had appraised the commission, inter alia to explore the possibility of
allowing an employee to undertake tour outside India once during the service
career in lieu of the Leave Travel Concession.
While oral evidences were going on with
the CPC by several Unions/Associations/Federations and all Central Govt.
employees were waiting for some good news from the CPC, their joy knew no
bounds with the declaration of our Hon’ble Prime Minister in his maiden speech
at SAARC Summit held in Nepal in November, 2014 emphasising with his soothing
words the need for enhancing connectivity in the region. The civil aviation
ministry gave its nod to a proposal to
provide LTC for government employees to Nepal, Bhutan,
Maldives and Sri Lanka to boost tourism in the region. It was told that Pakistan
and Bangladesh were left out for now because of security issues and the new LTC
Rules are being finalised by the Centre.
The issue was strongly highlighted
with terminological exquisites in the media along with the interview of Hon’ble
Minister of State, Personnel, Public Grievances and Pensions who told PTI "The
Government has been taking many steps to promote trade and travel. This is one
of such steps to further boost ties among SAARC nations. Employees will be able
to avail LTC to visit some SAARC countries. A proposal in this regard is being
finalised by the government," (as
published in http://www.business-standard.com,http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com,http://www.financialexpress.com, http://www.deccanchronicle.com).
Everybody waited for the golden
opportunity and good time to come.
But to the utter dissatisfaction and
surprise of all Central Govt. employees, the 7th CPC which submitted
its report to the Govt. on 19th November, 2015 narrated the
provision of granting interest free advances to Central Govt. employees as irrelevant
and outdated and recommended for abolition of such 12 interest-free advances including
LTC and Tour. (Para 9.1.4 of 7th
CPC Report).
Where are the good days? – all
Central Govt. employees grumbled. The recommendations of the 7th CPC
are certainly retrograde since employees’ welfare have been grossly ignored.
Mr. Mohapatra’s sweet dream to travel
abroad was rattled into pieces in a moment. He became ashamed of his promises
to his family. Now visit to Sri Lanka on his part is to build castles in the
air. His light purse made his heart heavy.
“Will the new LTC Rule at all bring
any benefit to the low paid employees ?” – he asked himself suffused with tears
in his eyes. Can a low paid employee gather lakhs of rupees to book the tickets
from his own pocket to avail LTC ?
Abolition of interest free advances is
only intended to discourage to avail LTC. The proficiency shown by the Pay
Commission through its analytical dexterity to save the costs involved in
administering these advances in Para
9.1.4 of its Report is absolutely whimsical and thus an impediment to employees’ welfare.
In
addition, now Govt has introduced a scheme for promotion of Adventure Sports
and similar activities amongst Central Govt. employees by providing financial
assistance to such eligible employees in the form of reimbursement of Travel
Expenses, programme fee and Hiring Charges of equipment. (DoPT letter No.
125/1/2015-16-CCSCSB, dated 4th December, 2015).
Presently,
an amount sufficient to
cover the officials’ personal travelling expenses is being sanctioned as
interest-free advance to be adjusted immediately after completion of the scheduled
tour. But if the Govt follows the recommendations of the 7th CPC,
nobody will be interested to avail such facility also.
While the
Govt. is declaring several welfare activities on one hand to gain popularity, recommendation
of the 7thCPC for abolition of advances to avail such facilities
remains quite jeering and unenthusiastic.
The Govt.
needs to address this issue carefully before implementation of such exceedingly
regressive recommendations.
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