Hyderabad: The Telangana Public Sector Employees’ Federation has expressed grave concern at being denied payment of interim relief (IR) even a year after it was granted for state government employees on October 2 last year. The file is pending approval in the Chief Minister’s Office after clearance from the finance department.
The order granting the release was signed by the Chief Minister’s Office on January 6. Documents with Deccan Chronicle show that the GO Ms No. 133 issued for their payment had reached the finance department on January 12.
The federation said the delay affected around 50,000 employees working in public sector undertakings, co-operative societies and non-teaching staff of the universities, among others. Employees working in the institutions under the Ninth and Tenth schedules of the bifurcation Act fall under this category.
The institutions are include the Housing Board, Telangana Housing Corporation, State Finance Corporation, Telangana Beverages Corporation and Telangana Civil Supplies Corporation. The BRS government had constituted its second pay revision commission (PRC) in October 2023 though the tenure of the first one formed after Telangana became a reality in 2014 had ended in July 2022.
“While the state government employees are awaiting the second PRC and payment of dearness allowance (DA), we are still waiting for our interim relief. If the government comes up with a second PRC before releasing our IR, we may have to forego it as that would be considered a notional loss as these arrears would not be paid,” said an official of one of the corporations.
The Congress gave the government employees the IR in December 2023, but we were left in the lurch, the official said, Another official lamented, “While the chairmen of 60 corporations are entitled to a salary of `1.5 lakh and other perks which amount to `4 lakh per month are being paid, we who work to earn that money are yet to get our due.”
