PTI targeting CJP for what its govt had pursued itself

ISLAMABAD: Proposal regarding an increase in retirement age, which is presently being politicised by the PTI social media to target Chief Justice Qazi Faez Isa, has also been under consideration of the Imran Khan government.

According to official record, the Prime Minister’s Office during Imran Khan’s tenure had conveyed to the finance secretary in June 2019 the-then premier’s desire that finance secretary should hold consultations with the Establishment Division and finance departments of the Punjab and KP to evaluate legal, financial and administrative implications of increasing the age of retirement and early retirement.

Additionally, Imran Khan government’s Dr Ishrat Husain-led Task Force on Civil Service Reforms had also considered the proposal for enhancing the retirement age of government servants from 60 to 63. In June 2019, the then PTI’s KP government’s cabinet was also reported to have extended the retirement age of provincial department employees to 63 years. It was claimed that the unprecedented decision would save an amount of Rs24 billion per annum for the provincial government.

Briefing the media on the decisions taken in the cabinet meeting, the then provincial minister for information Shaukat Yousafzai, while justifying the increase in retirement age, had said that the superannuation age for government employees in education and health sector in India was 60-65 years whereas it was also 60-65 in Europe and Brazil, 62 in Japan and 67 in the United States. He said that Article 240(b) of the Constitution allows the provincial government to enact legislation from the provincial legislature to this effect.

Yousafzai had also recalled that initially in the Civil Servant Act 1973, the retirement age for government employees was 50, which was later enhanced to 60 and enforced for the last 35 years. The life expectancy in Pakistan had increased to 63 years in 2018 from 55 in 1973, he was quoted as saying and added that each year around 5,000 employees reached the age of superannuation where the ratio of premature retirement was also around 50/50. Therefore, the number of employees attaining the age of 60 has reached 2,500 which cost Rs6 billion to the provincial kitty. The said decision of the KP government, however, remained unimplemented.

The present government is also considering the proposal to increase the age of all government servants to address the issue of growing pension bill. However, the PTI social media and some of its leaders have politicised this proposal as if the government was doing it only for the CJP.

Finance Minister Muhammad Aurangzeb recently proposed raising the retirement age and restructuring pension payments to alleviate the financial strain on the economy.