The National Council of the Joint Consultative Machinery, an official body comprising employee union leaders and bureaucrats, was scheduled to meet on Monday to discuss key subjects related to the 8th Pay Commission.
The meeting of NC-JCM was called by the Department of Personnel and Secretary to deliberate on the terms of reference for the 8th Pay Commission. It comes around three weeks after the Centre issued its nod for the pay panel's formation, to revise the salaries of central government employees and pensions of retirees.
Shiv Gopal Mishra, the NC-JCM staff side secretary and All India Railwaymen's Federation chief, had forwarded his list of suggestions to the government before the meeting.
Check key details from NC-JCM-DoPT meeting here.
Mishra suggested that the 8th Pay Commission should revise the pay structure, salary and retirement benefits in accordance to the the "recommendation of the 15th Indian Labour Conference", while also factoring in the Dr Aykroyd formula, which was used by the 7th Pay Commission to determine the entry-level minimum wages.
Dr Aykroyd's formula is linked to 20th-century American nutritionist Wallace R Aykroyd. The formula takes into consideration the increase in prices of various commodities that constitute a common person's basket, which is reviewed periodically by the Labour Bureau in Shimla.
After taking this formula into consideration, the 7th Pay Commission had used a fitment factor of 2.57 to raise the minimum salary from Rs 7,000 to Rs 18,000.
Mishra, while speaking to NDTV Profit before the 8th Pay Commission's formation was approved by the Centre, had stated that he was expecting a fitment factor of "not less than 2.86" for the next revision of salaries. If this is used as the fitment factor, then the minimum wage can rise from Rs 18,000 to Rs 51,480.
However, M Raghavaiah, chief of National Federation of Indian Railwaymen and staff side leader of the NC-JCM, told NDTV Profit last month that they are expecting the minimum wage to "rise to at least Rs 36,000".
The Rs 36,000-minimum wage demand indicates that the staff side may push for a fitment factor of 2.0, considering that the base entry-level minimum salary currently, excluding the dearness allowance, presently stands at Rs 18,000.
Merger Of Pay Scales
In the NC-JCM meeting on Monday, it was also expected that the employee union leaders would push for the merger of various pay scales. This was indicated after Mishra, in his list of suggestions to the government on the terms of reference for the 8th Pay Commission, said several "non-viable pay scales" should be merged.
"The 8th CPC should consider the merger of non-viable pay scales such as Level 1 with Level 2, and Level 3 with Level 4, and Level 5 with Level 6," he stated.
The staff side of the NC-JCM also sought an "immediate merger" of a portion of the DA with the salary of central government employees to provide them immediate relief. This demand comes in the backdrop of the DA already crossing 53% of the basic pay, following the last revision in the allowance in October.
Notably, under the 5th Pay Commission, the basic salary was to be revised once the DA crosses 50% of it. The norm was discontinued under the 6th Pay Commission. The 7th Pay Commission had proposed to restore it, but the government had not accepted this recommendation, Mishra said.
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