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| Charity begins at home! Employees rubbish govt advts | | | EARLY TIMES REPORT
JAMMU, Apr 9: Having presumably run out of all options to break the stalemate between it and the striking 4.5 lakh employees, the contentious issues now pose a threat to paralyse the government.
The situation has now gone from bad to worse, signalling a serious political problem besetting the Omar-led coalition.
Even the doors to discussions are shut on the government with the agitated employees saying parleys won't do anything now and this was the apt time for it to concede their genuine demands, including release of sixth pay commission arrears.
Left with no other option, the government, through multi-colour advertisements, that appeared in local dailies in the past four days, expressed its helplessness to concede employees' demands, claiming that its expenditure was more than the earnings.
The employees, however, rubbished the government claim, saying "charity begins at home. It first needs to stop draining the state exchequer in the name of unlimited facilities to chief minister, his cabinet colleagues, MLAs and MLCs".
Through the advertisements, the government said "it spends whopping Rs 25 cr a day on the salary of employees".
It, however, shied away in releasing account statement of how much per day it was spending on the large retinues of chief minister, ministers, MLAs and MLCs, besides bureaucrats, serving as well as retired.
It also did not come out with the details of the huge telephone bills of these public servants.
The advertisements were floated to mould public opinion against the striking employees after the draconian ESMA, an unbridled weapon in the hands of the politically bankrupt government, failed to deter employees.
When ESMA failed to break the deadlock, the "rusted" think-tanks of the government felt that if public opinion was moulded against the strike, the deadlock could break. For this purpose, they floated full-page coloured advertisements in local dailies, detailing how the strike was unjust and why the government was right.
The idea was if public turned against them, employees would be forced to call off their agitation. It, however, did not work and turned out to be a futile exercise.
There are over 4.5 lakh government employees in J&K. If we multiply 4.5 lakh with 5, ie employee's spouse, average two children and old parents, the number comes out to be 22.5 lakh, which constitutes a large chunk of the state population. Roughly, we can say there is a government employee in every 2nd or 3rd house in the twin capital cities of Jammu and Srinagar and major towns. Then who would turn against employees? Perhaps, none.
Govt says it cannot release 6th pay commission arrears of employees without central assistance.
If it is so, why it has enhanced the salaries of chief minister, ministers, MLAs and MLCs. Can it explain how much burden its this move has put on the state exchequer?
MLCs are a real burden on the state exchequer. Most of them either do not have a political background or are defeated MLAs. A huge amount of money is spent on their facilities and salaries. Wouldn't it be judicious to make the post of MLC honorary?
Bureaucrats, serving or retired, too enjoy facilities in Mughlia fashion. Dozens of cops could be seen cleansing floors, washing clothes and doing other menial works in the private houses of retired police and civil officers.
There were at least a hundred such officers of the rank of SSP, DIGs, IGPs, ADGPs and DGPs, who were enjoying these facilities even after their retirement.
Has the government ever thought that it was giving salaries to these cops for maintaining the social standards of retired officers?
Crores of rupees are being wasted this way.
A cop, who is supposed to guard people against anti-socials, works as a servant with these retired public servants, who are proving to be a big burden on the state exchequer.
Government says state's total income is Rs 3,600 cr, while the expenditure on employees' salary bill, pension bill and dearness allowance is Rs 11,525 cr. It claims that Rs 4,200 cr were required to pay sixth pay commission arrears to employees.
If the government's financial health was so weak, it ought to seriously think to devise innovative ways for increasing state's income.
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