Vijayawada: Secretariat employees claim Guaranteed Pension Scheme erroneous, ambiguous

Vijayawada : Strongly opposing the proposed Guaranteed Pension Scheme (GPS) since it is erroneous and ambiguous and demanding the restoration of Old Pension Scheme (OPS) as announced by Chief Minister YS Jagan Mohan Reddy on the floor of the Assembly, the AP Secretariat CPS Association appealed to Chief Secretary K S Jawahar Reddy to restore OPS and scrap the Contributory Pension Scheme.

President of the Association Kotla Rajesh and general secretary Ambati Venkateswarlu in a memorandum submitted to the Chief Secretary requested him here on Friday to restore the time-tested old pension scheme on the lines of Rajasthan, Chhattisgarh, Himachal Pradesh and other States keeping in view the certain errors and ambiguities in the AP Guaranteed Pension Scheme ordinance.

Referring to the errors in the ordinance, they said that the ordinance speaks about the benefits like 50 per cent pension guarantee and providing DR to the retired CPS employees explicitly, but the costs/conditions to the CPS employees in lieu of receiving those benefits are not properly mentioned or implicitly mentioned.

It is evident from the previous year and current year investment to CPS, the government is intentionally not transferring contributions to Permanent Retirement Account Number (PRAN) accounts in time.

March-2022 contributions were transferred in March-2023 to August-2023. From March-2023, the deducted amounts from monthly salaries have not been transferred to PRAN accounts so far.

So, in the absence of provisions for charging of interest and penal interest for the delayed transfer of funds to PRAN account of the CPS employees, the strict implementation of the ordinance/Act and the spirit behind the ordinance/Act will not survive, they said.

The Association leaders also pointed out that there was no clarity on annuity plan selection option for getting maximum percentage of guarantee.

They said that how can a CPS employee analyse the best option between CPS and GPS.

There is also no clarity on providing minimum pension on par with OPS employees, EHS benefits and accidental insurance as given in the GPS presentation by the government.

Moreover there is no mention about the application of AP Revised Pension Rules, 1980 for the purpose of Basic Pension amount guarantee, they pointed out.

In view of these, the proposed GPS ordinance will be erroneous, ambiguous and disadvantageous to the CPS employees in the State, the association leaders concluded.