Unfortunate retirements - Just over a day

What happened on 31 December 2005 ? Yeah.. something very important has happened.

1 January 2006 was all the way different from its previous day... Atleast for all Central Government employees. Being an employee on 1 Jan 2006 makes a lot of difference from having been an employee on or before 31 Dec 2005 ( and not being an employee on 1Jan 2006).

Let me put here, my personal views, on the 'injustice' implemented by our Government.

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The Sixth Pay Commission has been so generous to the Central Government Employees. But, equally too, they are so cruel to some of the pensioners.

The retirement benefits ( the amount of money, lumpsum) given to a retiring employee is meant to build a ‘retired life’ for him and his family. The pension is for the maintenance of his and his family’s life. These are the benefits obtained for burning their lives (the whole life) for the Government (society).

An employee retired on 31 December 2005 is not qualified for the retirement benefits as announced by 6PC (although there is a very small increase in the monthly pension, on the principle of ‘one rank one pension’). Had he retired on the next day, 1 January 2006, things would have been very different. He would have got the new terms of retirement, which is far higher than those applicable for 31 December 2005. A day makes so much of difference. The difference is so large that he feels very miserable, when he think of this ONE DAY. People who retired around that period – in 2005- feel so bad, miserable and dejected; just over a few day’s or week’s difference.

The retirement benefits of two persons of the same position and pay ( one retired on 31Dec 2005 and the other on 1Jan 2006) should be almost equal ( atleast comparable in the amount of terminal benefits and subsequent monthly pension). That’s natural justice, I believe. To give an example, when my 010106 friend got 10 lakhs as his gratuity, another one (311205) got just 3.5. This is certainly not fair. It’s not justice.

But the 6PC and the Government has not looked at the implementation in this angle. This is cruel and injustice. I strongly feel that the Government should normalize this huge difference caused by that milestone day. The improved retirement benefits and pension should be applicable to those retired earlier too (pre 2006). The applicability of the benefits may be made in a tapering method. May be, 10% less for every year preceding 2006 (eg. For persons retired in 2005, the terminal benefits may be 90% of what a person retiring on 1Jan 2006 gets). This would atleast bring in some justice to those unfortunate ones.The financial load on the Government by implementing such a justice would not be very high.

I wish, our Government would consider the plight of the retired people, and do a normalization of terminal benefits and pension.