Cabinet likely to take up 7th pay panel report on Wednesday

The union cabinet is likely to discuss the 7th Pay Commission recommendations on Wednesday, government sources said.

The recommendations will result in a hike in salaries of nearly 50 lakh central government employees and payouts of 58 lakh pensioners.

The government set up an Empowered Committee of Secretaries under Cabinet Secretary P.K. Sinha in January to look into the pay commission recommendations.

The committee has since submitted its report to the Finance Ministry, Finance Secretary Ashok Lavasa said on Monday, adding the ministry will draft a cabinet note based on the report.

The commission has recommended a minimum pay of Rs 18,000 per month, fixed an upper ceiling at Rs 2,25,000 per month for Apex Scale and Rs 2,50,000 per month for Cabinet Secretary and others at present at the same pay level.

The date of implementation for the recommendations is January 1, 2016.

The total financial impact of implementing the pay commission recommendations in the 2016-17 fiscal is likely to be Rs 1,02,100 crore, as per government estimates.

Of this, increase in pay will account for an expenditure of Rs 39,100 crore, increase in allowances take up another Rs 29,300 crore while pension increase will entail an expenditure of Rs 33,700 crore.

The pay panel has also recommended 'one rank one pension' kind of set-up for the central government's all civil employees, Central Armed Police Forces as well as defence personnel to bring "parity between past pensioners and current retirees with the same length of service" who retired before January 1, 2016.

--IANS

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