Govt to rejig laws for pay hike to President, V-P

NEW DELHI: The Centre is firming up changes to three laws to give the President, Vice-President and governor a pay hike to ensure they do not earn less than senior civil servants, including their key aides.

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The laws passed by Parliament in 2008 entitle the President to a monthly salary of Rs 1.5 lakh, the Vice-President to Rs 1.25 lakh and governors to Rs 1.1 lakh.

Under the new pay scales cleared by the government for civil servants, the cabinet secretary will get a monthly salary of Rs 2.5 lakh, a secretary to the government will get Rs 2.25 lakh and an additional secretary upwards of Rs 1.82 lakh. A joint secretary level officer will get a basic salary ranging between Rs 1.18 lakh and Rs 2.14 lakh, depending on how many years they have spent at the post. Government officials said if the change wasn’t made, the President would receive a salary lower than about 14 officials at Rashtrapati Bhavan.

The amendment in the three laws that govern salaries of the President, Vice-President and governor could reach the Union Cabinet for its approval as early as next week. Parliament will have to clear the changes. Like the civil servants, the pay hike for the President and others too would be effective from January 1 this year, irrespective of when the parliamentary approval comes in. Laws regulating their pensions too would be similarly amended.

‘HIKE MPLAD, SALARY’

A delegation of parliamentarians met PM Narendra Modi on Wednesday, seeking a raise in the local area development fund and also flagged the issue of parliamentarians getting poor salaries. Modi was given a memorandum signed by 255 parliamentarians making demands to raise the MPLAD fund meant for development of their constituency from its current ceiling of Rs 5 crore per year to Rs 25 crore.