No pay hike for now, Panjab University to wait for government notification
7th Pay Commission: Senate accepts recommendations of syndicate and board of finance even as PUTA objects.
The Panjab University (PU) senate on Saturday decided to wait for the Punjab government to implement the 7th Pay Commission recommendations before going ahead with the pay hike of its employees.
If implemented, it will put ₹100 crore additional burden on the fund-starved varsity.
Vice-chancellor AK Grover informed the senate that the recommendations can’t be implemented till Punjab notifies them and agrees to pay ₹22-crore additional grant.
“We will be able to know by the end of this semester if we can pay salaries (arrears),” he added.
Earlier, Panjab University Teachers Association (PUTA) president Rajesh Gill demanded that the recommendations of the PU syndicate and varsity’s board of finance (BoF) on implementation of the 7th Pay Commission should not be accepted.
“When 100% salaries of teachers are given by the Centre, then why should we wait for Punjab’s notification?” questioned Gill. “It is the Centre paying the salaries, not Punjab,” she said, adding that the Centre be approached to release an additional grant for implementing new pay scales for the PU faculty.
However, the V-C said that only a component of the salaries is paid by the Centre and the remaining has to be generated by the varsity.
“We can’t have a situation where the recommendations are implemented for a set of employees and the others are made to wait,” he said.
PU has 1,350 faculty members and 2,609 non-teaching employees. The central funding can pay for the revised salaries of only 1,800 non-teaching employees besides the faculty. The varsity will need ₹66 corre for paying the arrears for January 1, 2016, to March 31, 2018, and ₹33 crore for paying the enhanced salary from April 2016 to March 2019.
Earlier, the BoF and syndicate had recommended that the 7th pay commission be implemented only after Punjab decides to revise the pay scales of its employees. On November 28, the Union ministry of human resource development (MHRD) had also suggested the same. As of now, Punjab has not committed any deadline.
₹556-crore budget gets nod
Meanwhile, the senate approved the syndicate decision on budget estimates of ₹556.38 crore for 2018-19.
The budget has been hiked by 5.5% from ₹527 crore in 2017-18. The university aims to generate ₹307 crore on its own, which was ₹293 crore in 2017-18.
The PU expects to have an income of ₹14 crore from tuition fee in teaching departments as compared to ₹12 crore in 2017. It also expects ₹21 crore income from registration/certificate/entrance test fee as compared to ₹19 crore in 2017. PU expects to get ₹13 crore from hostels and ₹3 crore from sports fee. However, ₹2 crore tuition fee hike is yet to be effected.
Quotes:
“When 100% salaries of teachers are given by the Centre, then why should we wait for Punjab’s notification?”
Rajesh Gill, PUTA president
“We can’t have a situation where recommendations are implemented for a set of employees and others are made to wait.”
AK Grover, PU vice-chancellor