The Hindu : Karnataka News : Differences among govt. staff over strike call

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Friday, Nov 05, 2004

Karnataka

Karnataka

Differences among govt. staff over strike call

By Our Special Correspondent

BANGALORE, NOV. 4. Differences among the State Government employees have come to the fore on the constitution of the fifth pay commission, with the Akhila Karnataka State Government Employees' Federation accusing the Karnataka State Government Employees' Association (KSGEA) of indulging in "blackmail politics" by calling an indefinite strike by the employees from November 17 on the issue.

Addressing presspersons here today, the president of the federation, U.D. Narasimhaiah, said his counterpart in the employees' association, K. Sippe Gowda, had not taken the federation into confidence before announcing its decision to go on strike. There were no instances in the history of employees' association of its giving a call for an indefinite strike on an issue such as constitution of the pay commission. The federation had convened a meeting of its executive committee on Sunday to decide whether it should support the strike or not, he added.

He alleged that the KSGEA had been misleading the government employees saying the federation was not recognised. He said that fearing that the Government might grant recognition, Mr. Sippe Gowda approached the High Court and obtained a stay order by allegedly providing wrong information. The federation had provided facts to the High Court and appealed to it to vacate the stay order, Mr. Narasimhaiah said.

He claimed that in recent days, the federation was gaining strength at the district and taluk levels and it had over 1.5 lakh employees as members.

The federation urged the Government to merge 50 per cent of the dearness allowance (DA) of its employees with the basic pay as was done by the Union Government. (The State has increased the DA of its employees to 64 per cent from 61 per cent with effect from July 1.)

Mr. Narasimhaiah said most of the government employees had expressed their desire for a merger of 50 per cent of the DA with the basic pay.

He demanded that the Government remove the disparity in pay between employees of the Union and State governments, and revise house rent allowance and other allowances on the basis of reclassification of cities, as was done by the Union Government on the basis of the 2001 Census.

Opposing transfers being carried out this month, Mr. Narasimhaiah said many departments had violated guidelines. Employees were facing problems such as finding accommodation in their new places of posting. He urged the Government to drop the proposal to reduce pension benefits by introducing reforms.

The general secretary of the federation, B.S. Sachidananda Murthy, was present.

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