Five years on, pay hike still eludes RTC staff

Hyderabad: The Telangana State Road Transport Corporation (TSRTC) was supposed to provide a salary increment for its 47,000 employees in 2017, but it has been five years now and a pay revision announcement is nowhere to be seen. Their Dearness Allowance (DA) and two consecutive salary hikes too have remained pending for a long time now.

As the per pay scale agreement, the corporation has to increase its employee's salary once every four years. The salaries that were to be revised back in 2017 remains in limbo, including the money that has to be added to their salaried amount. The corporation's employees' union has urged the State government to implement a pay revision for the employees of the public transport on par with that of the State-run public sectors.

According to RTC employees, it has been almost six years that the pay scale remains unrevised by the government. The long-awaited pay revision along with the fitment is yet to be implemented for the RTC employees.

Former APSRTC board director and trade union leader M Nageswara Rao pointed out that RTC workers have been neglected by the government. "The employees' salaries are less than that of a government employee on the same level working in other public sectors and are also deprived of their rights. Even the routine pay revision, which should be executed once every four years, is also delayed by the government. We demanded the government to revise the pay scale, much like other government departments and State-run public sectors," he said.

"RTC employees receive a basic pay of Rs 10,880. While the employees of other State-run public sectors, who also have a eight-hour duty, like the Electricity Department receive a comparatively higher minimum pay of Rs 23,380", Nageswara stated and added, "The State Electricity Department received the fresh pay scale this year, but there has been no revision for TSRTC, something that is unseen in the last five decades of the corporation's history."

On the condition of anonymity, an RTC employee said, "Since 2017, the cost of living has increased and we employees are still receiving the six-year-old pay. We are helpless and it is difficult to support our families with this salary. We urge the State government to revise and increase the pay scale, in comparison to other public-sector employees".