7th Pay Commission: Why is Narendra Modi government dilly dallying to implement higher allowances?

In last one year a lot have been spoken about the higher allowances under the 7th pay Commission by the Union Government officials and along with several other members of various central government employeesunion. But it is strange that an important issue – on employees higher allowances – has now been strangely absent from the government agenda, due to which there is no final outcome.

The real question which comes in front of central government employees is that after the approval of 7th Pay Commission recommendations on July 1, 2016; Why is Narendra Modi government is dilly-dallying to implement the recommendations under the higher allowances?

Some reports suggest that Finance Minister Arun Jaitley had first claimed that the higher allowances must be implemented after four months of the basic pay hike but it failed to come true. Some suggest that complicated bureaucracy is stopping the government to implement higher allowances.

Almost 15 months have passed since the Union Government led by Prime Minister Narendra Modi was given a detailed report on 7th Pay Commission and seven months have elapsed since the Union Cabinet approved the 7CPC recommendations for salary hike of central government employees, but the government is still dilly dallying for the higher allowances.

The government has decided to give higher basic pay in August 2016 with arrears, which will be effective from January 1, 2016, to its employees on the recommendations of a high-powered committee headed by Sri Ashok Lavasa. But the hike in allowances other than dearness allowance referred to the high-powered committee recommended of abolishing 51 allowances and subsuming 37 others out of 196 allowances.

As per now, the central government employees are paid allowances according to the 6th Pay Commission recommendations until issuing of higher allowances notification. In October 2016, Ashok Lavasa said, “We are ready to submit our report, whenever Finance Minister Arun Jaitley calls up”.

But the union government gave an extension to the high-powered committee up to February 22, 2017, on the pretext of demonetisation and the government said that the cash crunch was the reason behind the delay in announcing higher allowances.

The announcement of assembly elections in five states has given an excuse for the government as it cannot announce pay hikes till the model code of conduct is in place up to March 8. The government is using delaying tactics to save the government money to pay higher allowances without arrears from August 16.

Also, the delay in the implementation of higher allowances has caused tremendous frustration among employees. There are chances that the BJP led NDA government may face a backlash in the assembly elections in the five states, two of which is ruled by the party either directly or in an alliance.