E-Paper
PU seeks increase in annual grant from Punjab
PU is currently in the midst of revising salary scales, which will benefit over 600 teaching and 3,000 non-teaching staff. While the staff may soon get their salaries as per the new pay scales, payment of arrears is going to be an uphill task for the university. PU had earlier also written to UGC to re-determine or reset its annual grant to PU.
In view of implementation of revised pay scales for teaching and non-teaching staff, Panjab University (PU) has written to the Punjab government seeking enhancement of its annual recurring grant to the varsity, besides a one-time grant to clear arrears.
PU is currently in the midst of revising salary scales, which will benefit over 600 teaching and 3,000 non-teaching staff. While the staff may soon get their salaries as per the new pay scales, payment of arrears is going to be an uphill task for the university. PU had earlier also written to UGC to re-determine or reset its annual grant to PU.
While the PU senate – varsity’s apex governing body – had adopted the 6th Punjab Pay Commission for non-teaching staff in March, the syndicate – the executive arm of senate – last month adopted the Punjab government’s notification to implement the revised UGC pay scales as per 7th pay commission for teaching staff. The same has been cleared by the senate on Friday.
Financial burden on university
The implementation of revised pay scales will translate into a one-time burden of ₹278 crore for PU, due to arrears since 2016, along with ₹56 crore recurring liability including pension.
As per the university’s annual budget, the total expenditure for the fiscal stands at ₹992.29 crore, of which the expenditure on salaries amounts to ₹412 crore. The salary cost is expected to increase to ₹480 crore in the next financial year.
As per the revised budget of the current financial year, the grant from UGC is pegged at ₹278 crore and ₹41 crore from Punjab government. The varsity’s internal income and annual maintenance grant comes to ₹677 crore, due to which the university has proposed a supplementary grant of ₹314 crore to bridge the revenue gap.
Developmental needs
PU has also sought a one-time rejuvenation grant of ₹56 crore from Punjab citing developmental needs, besides ₹37.62 crore for the construction of a building for the regional centre at Sri Muktsar Sahib.
The university also sought release of pending grant of ₹20 crore under post-matric scholarship (PMS) scheme and ₹2 crore balance grants for completion of construction of the rural centre at Kauni.
As an inter-state body corporate, PU receives annual maintenance grants from both the Centre and Punjab. The present arrangement of funding of PU was determined by the ministry of education (MoE) in 2017. The amount of grant to be released to the university was calculated on the basis of the actual salary expenditure in the pre-revised pay structure with a provision of 6% annual enhancement.
