Congress today came out in support of the proposed July 11 strike by central government employees in protest against the 7th Pay Commission recommendations which the party termed as the "worst" in the last 70 years and accused the Modi government of being "unjust" to them.
Senior party spokesman Ajay Maken said the central government employees are a "frustrated and disappointed" lot as the government decided "not to make improvement" in the recommendations.
"It is unfortunate that the employees, who were given 40 per cent hike in their respective pay in the past by previous governments, had now been recommended only 14.27 per cent. This is unjust and humiliating for the beneficiaries," he told reporters.
Noting that the Federation of Government Employees, which includes employees of Indian Railways, civilian employees of Ordnance Factories and Post and Telegraph, has decided to go on strike from July 11 to express their resentment, he said "We support them and hope good sense will prevail and government of India will review the decision."
"In the history of CPC in the last about 70 years, this is the worst recommendations and needed major surgery to make it acceptable to the employees and meet their expectation up to some extent," Maken, a former Union Minister, said.
To a question about the recommendations with regard to the Armed Forces employees and whether Congress supports them, he replied in the affirmative.
"It is not that the Armed Forces are getting more and the others are getting less. Armed Forces are, rather in certain ways, are bigger sufferers.", he remarked.
Making a strong pitch for a better deal to government employees, he asked "If you do not have the best brains working in the government, then how can you expect government or the government employees to protect the interest vis-a-vis the multi-nationals in this era of globalisation?"
An RSS-affiliate Bhartiya Mazdoor Sangh has already raised a banner of revolt against the Centre's decision on the Pay Commission recommendations and declared it would organise country-wide protests on July 8.
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Meanwhile, CPI(M) Politburo termed as "disappointing" the said the central pay hike is and demanded that the government hear the views of the employees organisations and on that basis to make a revised announcement.
Based on the Seventh Central Pay Commission's recommendations, there is only an increase of 14.2 per cent in the emoluments in terms of gross salary and the increase in the take-home pay is just 7.4 per cent for the lowest category, it said in a statement.
The ratio between the lowest and the highest scale continues to be wide with the ratio being 1:14, it added.
"It is unfortunate that the government did not consider it worthwhile to have discussions with the employees' organisations before making the announcement on salaries and pension," the party said.
