Pak Secretariat employees seek a raise

ISLAMABAD: Hundreds of Pak Secretariat employees Friday gathered in front of the finance ministry asking the government to increase their salaries on the pattern of the PM Office, the President House, NAB, FIA, FBR and the judiciary.

The government had agreed in principle to the demand of public sector employees but it is yet to be fulfilled. The government argued that it could not succumb to the pressure of few hundreds agitating employees so they could not fulfil their demands right now keeping in view the timing because if these demands were fulfilled then everyone would come on the street on eve of coming budget for 2020-21. However, a top official said they did not know what Dr Ishrat Hussain-led committee was doing to suggest on the issue of salary structure when there were distortions from top to bottom.

“Without uniformity as benchmark, there is no incentive to work with dedication in the public sector,” said the official.

The salaries of PM office, Presidency, Judiciary, NAB, FIA and FBR employees are higher than others and the government recently increased the salary of FIA employees by 136 percent costing an estimated Rs2.6 billion to the state kitty.

“With the increase in the Pak Secretariat Allowance, its estimated cost stands at Rs3 billion just for the current fiscal year,” said one top official of Finance Division on Friday.

He said the Pak Secretariat employees demand was justified because the government had raised the pay structure of certain departments but ignored others causing a sense of discrimination among the public sector employees.

The protesting employees threatened to go on pen-down strike for an indefinite period if their demands were not fulfilled.

The government is considering providing 70 and 50 percent Secretariat Allowance/Hardship allowance for employees from grade 1 to 16 and grade 17 to 20 respectively.

Seniors in grade 21 and 22 have agreed that they should not be given Secretariat Allowance and pay raise for them should be considered on eve of coming budget for 2020-21.

“There are distortions in the salary structure of different government departments and there is a need to bring uniformity in it,” said official sources while talking to The News here on Friday.

Special Secretary Finance Ministry Omar Hamid Khan had negotiated with the agitating public sector employees last week and promised to fulfil their demands in one week. He had suggested Dr Abdul Hafeez Shaikh to raise the salaries of Pak Secretariat employees with immediate effect.

It is yet to be seen how the government is going to increase the salaries of public sector employees because increased inflationary pressures have burdened them hard.

Another area of concern for the economic managers is ballooning burden of pension amount and inability of the government to undertake the much desired reforms with the introduction of contributory pension concept.

If the pension sector is run without reforms for next few years then the next looming crisis will be on front of smooth pension payment to retired personnel of armed forces and civilians.