Interim relief to Telangana staff may not come on Independence Day

​Hyderabad: The possibility of the announcement of interim relief (IR) to the government employees under the new Pay Revision Commission (PRC) on Independence Day on August 15 appears remote as the Telangana state government is stuck in procedural delays.

Long-pending clearance of two DAs by the state Finance department and the PRC consuming more time to ascertain the financial burden under the new pay revision gave clear indication that the government is likely to postpone the announcement of IR again.

Even though the time to announce the IR is only two weeks, state Finance department officials said that they did not receive any official communication from the Chief Minister’s Office to finalise the IR. The PRC also did not communicate its preliminary observations on the financial implications under the new PRC.
The pending two DAs have come as a major hurdle to the finalisation of interim relief. 

he release of the employees’ DA for the period of first six months from January to June and the announcement of DA from July to till December this year are still pending before the government. Without clearing the pending DAs, the announcement of IR is ruled out, Telangana Employees’ Union president A Padmachary said.

The Union leader said that the employees expected the inclusion of IR and pending DAs would be part of the agenda at the Friday’s cabinet meeting, but the government set aside the two issues. The Chief Minister made the promise of announcement of IR on Telangana formation day on June 2. Due to delay in the constitution of PRC and its Terms of Reference (ToR), the government deferred decision on IR till August 15.

Official said that a mere 1 per cent IR will impose an additional burden of Rs 300 crore per annum on the government. A relief of 10 per cent would increase the burden to Rs 3,000 crore per annum and 20 per cent to Rs 6,000 crore per annum. 

Keeping in view the state financial position after the launch of Rythu Bandhu scheme, the government will have to find alternative resources to shoulder the financial burden once the IR is announced. The government is planning to announce IR only when the PRC submitted its first report which is likely in September, sources said.