Jagan hikes retirement age to 62 yrs, fitment to 23%

Amaravati: Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister Y.S Jagan Mohan Reddy on Friday increased the retirement age from 60 years to 62 years, hiked PRC fitment by 9%, and announced a timeline to implement the Contributory Pension Scheme (CPS).

During a meeting with various employee unions here on Friday, the Chief Minister increased the fitment from 14.29% to 23% and said the new pay scale will come into force from January 2022. He said the new fitment is almost 9% more than that suggested by the Chief Secretary Committee and come into retrospective effect from 1 July 2018.

Similarly, the monetary benefits will be applied from 1 April 2020 and the enhanced pay scale along with pending DA's will be effective from January 2022, Jagan said. He added that the decision shall put an additional burden of Rs. 10,247 crore on the state treasury. All pending arrears like PF, GLI, and leave encashments will be cleared by April 2022, the CM announced.

Considering employees' experience as an asset to the state, the Chief Minister announced increasing the retirement age from 60 to 62 years to make better use of their services. The new rule will be implemented from January 2022.

In regard to CPS, he said a decision will be made by the end of June as a Cabinet sub-committee has already been formed.

Further, Jagan assured that jobs would be provided to family members of employees who died of COVID-19 under compassionate grounds by the end of June. He also constituted a committee with the chief secretary to revamp the Employee Health Scheme (EHS) for better implementation. The panel has been asked to resolve the issues within two weeks.

For those employees working in village and ward secretariats, a revised pay scale will be given from July this year after the completion of the probation and the confirmation process by 30 June, Jagan said.

He also announced providing houses to those employees who don't own a house by reserving 10% of the plots in MIG layouts in Jagananna Smart Townships and said a 20% rebate will be provided. The constituency will be treated as a unit and no employee will be deprived of housing, he added.

The Chief Minister said many states are already implementing the Central government's pay revision and said the state government shall also follow the same from now on.

He held talks with the union leaders of various government employees' organizations along with finance minister Buggana Rajendranath and government advisor Sajjala Ramakrishna Reddy prior to the announcement.