Cabinet decision to increase retirement age deferred
The government may make the announcement in the Prime Minister’s 15 August address…
A proposal to increase the retirement age of government employees from
60 to 62 years came to the Cabinet on Thursday but a decision was
deferred. The government might make the announcement in the Prime
Minister’s Independence Day address, his last before general elections
in 2014. The ministry of personnel, public grievances and pensions has
proposed an increase in retirement age of government employees from 60
to 62 years, top sources confirmed.
There are around five million central government employees in India. The
previous occassion the government raised the retirement age of central
government employees was in 1998, from 58 to 60 years. The move is meant
to ease the financial burden on the government in terms of its pension
liabilities, sources said.
The retirement age of professors in all central universities was
recently raised to 65 years. D L Sachdev, national secretary of the All
India Trade Union Congress, said his union was totally against the
increase of the retirement age beyond 60. It would hurt the youth,
especially when the government is doing nothing to create jobs for them,
Sachdev said.
Congress-affiliated Indian National Trade Union Congress national
president Sanjeeva Reddy said his union had been demanding increase in
the retirement age to 62 years and would welcome it.
Minister for Personnel, Public Grievances and Pensions V Narayanaswami
had ruled out an increase in the retirement age to a question in
Parliament in the winter session this year. An official in the ministry,
when asked, refused to speak about it.
Source : www.business-standard.com
