Railway unions to organise rally seeking OPS

Mumbai: Railway unions will externally support the strike called by state government employees from March 14 seeking scrapping of the National Pension Scheme (NPS) and restoring the Old Pension Scheme (OPS)

Mumbai: Railway unions will externally support the strike called by state government employees from March 14 seeking scrapping of the National Pension Scheme (NPS) and restoring the Old Pension Scheme (OPS).

HT Image

The railway unions will also organise a pan-India rally on the issue on March 21. They had carried out an online petition and collected over 1.26 crore signatures from the current and retired railway employees along with their families from February 10 to 20.

Railway unions said the NPS is proving to be disastrous to employees and their families. “Employees are contributing 10% of their salaries each month for the pension fund. However, on retirement they get a meagre pension of ₹2,000-4,000 under the NPS, whereas the same employee would have got up to ₹25,000 monthly pension under the OPS. The pension scheme should be the same for employees as well as MPs/MLAs,” Shiva Gopal Mishra, general secretary, All India Railwaymen’s Federation (AIRF), said.

On February 27, Mishra met different railway unions at Grant Road to discuss the OPS. There are around 13 lakh rail employees of which 7.5 lakh fall under the bracket of the NPS. Sources said these employees are those who are working after 2004 from when the NPS replaced the OPS. Rail unions said employees under the NPS contribute 10% from their salary, while the government’s share is 14%. In OPS, the entire 24% is paid by the government.

“We will carry out different activities on the 21st of every month starting from February. In May, we will take out a torchlight procession with current and former rail employees along with their families and beneficiaries. We will have a mega rally in July and August during the monsoon session. We want even those who joined Indian Railways after 2004 to get the benefits of the OPS,” JR Bhosale, convenor, Joint Forum for Restoration of Old Pension Scheme (Maharashtra and Gujarat) and working president, Western Railway Employees Union, said.