Pay Commission to submit its report by June

Election gap enabled commission to fine tune its recommendations

GANGTOK, May 21: The 4th Pay Commission today said that its recommendations and report on the pay structure of the State government employees which is in the final stage of completion will be submitted to the State government by the end of next month.
“The basic structure of the report is ready and whatever changes or revision is being done. All studies are over. The report will be submitted to the government by June”, said the Commission member secretary BP Pradhan to SIKKIM EXPRESS.
The Commission had been constituted by the State government in August 18 last year headed by former Chief Justice of Sikkim High Court RK Patra. The Commission had been entrusted to examine pay scales of all categories of state government employees and to suggest changes which may be feasible and desirable by March 31, 2009.
However, the time frame given to the 4th Pay Commission was unrealistic. The Commission had to first call hearings from all the stakeholders, study and then finalize the report which could not be completed by the stipulated deadline.
The election process starting and subsequent implementation of model code of conduct from March 2 also delayed the Commission.
However, as the Commission puts it, the two months time gap of the election process set them on course for the preparation of a comprehensive report.
The delay has been to the advantage of the employees and we used the election time to take care of the gaps, do revision and make changes wherever required, said the member secretary.
The term of the Commission has also been extended. However, we are quite positive that the report will be submitted to the government by June, said the Commission.
After the report is formally submitted, the recommendations will have to be scrutinized very carefully by another high level commission to be constituted by the State government which is also a lengthy process. 
Finally the report has to be passed by the State cabinet possibly pushing the implementation of the report to the second half of this year.
It is informed that the first three months were spent on hearing the suggestions and demands of different employees’ associations in the State. We heard each and every one of them as we are a full fledged Commission, said Mr. Pradhan. The preliminaries and hearings took a lot of time, he said.
Though the employees’ organizations have been quite vocal and visible in submitting their representations, the same cannot be said for the other members of the society. No individual from the society came up with his or her suggestions, it is informed.
However, the pensioners have been quite active and they had been dropping at the office of the Commission on regular intervals.
The Commission informed that whatever suggestions and grievances submitted by individuals and associations have been compiled and suitably considered. The Commission had also visited all the four districts to ascertain the views of the district officials in the first two months of the year.
During the hearings and submission of representations, most of demands were on pay structure at par with the Centre. The Commission had earlier informed that it is trying to adapt the Central Sixth Pay Commission with some modifications. The arrangement the Commission is trying is to work out an absolute or relative parity with the Centre.

source: sikkimexpress,com