Sixth Pay Commission: The people seek to join the tyrants

Sixth Pay Commission: The people seek to join the tyrants

Bharat Jhunjhunwala
11 Sep 2008 02:08:00 AM IST

THE economy is slowing down. The growth rate this year is expected to be around seven per cent, down steeply from 11 per cent. The burden of the Sixth Pay Commission will not help. Salaries were increased mainly because the government had the capacity to pay. Justice Sri Krishna, chairman of the Pay Commission, was very much pleased that the government had not only accepted his recommendations but also improved on them. He is reported to have said: “We had worked on the numbers that the Ministry of Finance had given us. My job was to give the award within those parameters and we did that. The government has improved upon the numbers.” This makes it clear that the sole criterion for recommending the increase in salary was the paying capacity of the government.Welfare of the people is no longer the objective of the government.


The government imposes taxes on the people to provide increased salaries to its employees.

It is also difficult to determine the ‘capacity’ of the government to bear the burden of such payments. The government can generate as much capacity as it wants. The government has the right to print currency notes. The government was not in a position to bear the burden of the Fifth Pay Commission. Yet the increase was made. Some revenue was ‘created’ by increasing the fiscal deficit; the rest was deducted from productive investments like building of roads.

The salaries of government employees should, in my opinion, be determined in proportion to the income of the people.

Data provided by the World Bank indicates that the salaries of government employees are about one to two times the average income of the people in most countries. India is an exception.

According to the Economic Survey published by the Ministry of Finance, the average income of public sector employees was Rs 3,25,774 in 2007. The income of the common man is much less.

I reckon the daily wage of the common man to be Rs 100. This amounts to Rs 30,000 per annum. The income of government employees, therefore, is about 10 times that of the common man. This is just the ‘official’ income.

Professor R Vaidyanathan of the Indian Institute of Management, Bangalore, has assessed that government employees earn about four times their salaries through corruption.

The real income of government employees, therefore, is about 40 times that of the common man. The Sixth Pay Commission increases this further! Government employees argue that the incomes of people like Ratan Tata and Narayana Murthy are not taken into account while determining their salaries. Salaries of MLAs and MPs too are beyond the review of the Pay Commission.

The politicians are free to determine their own salaries. This argument is flawed.

Ratan Tata and other industrialists invest their own money and take a great risk. Many lose all their wealth and go bankrupt. Government employees face no such risk. For example, the engineers who constructed the embankments on the river Kosi will not have to pay compensation for the breaches which have led to a huge loss of life and money. They will continue to draw their salaries and also get the benefits of the Sixth Pay Commission.

Politicians have to face the public every five years. Rajiv Gandhi and Sukh Ram did not pass this test. They were removed from their positions by the unsatisfied voters. Government employees face no such test. Another argument is that welfare schemes are implemented by government employees. They cannot be expected to deliver in the absence of adequate compensation.

But it is seen that welfare schemes have become merely another Kamadhenu for government employees. This author had the occasion to visit Gorakhpur as a consultant to an international NGO in the aftermath of the floods of 1998. Several people disclosed that they had to shell out Rs 200 to the revenue officials in order to get their relief of Rs 1,000. It is seen that the ‘cut’ taken by government employees has only increased after the implementation of the Fifth Pay Commission.

More salary seems to increase their demand for a parallel increase in unofficial income. A car or a fleet of taxis owned by the patwari is not an unusual event.

The Sixth Pay Commission should have made a strong recommendation for increasing the accountability of the government employees instead of just recommending an increase in their salaries.

For example, the performance of every employee should be assessed by a confidential survey.

A questionnaire can be sent to the consumers to assess the performance of the electricity board lineman and engineer.

An independent authority like the Vigilance Commission can be set up to provide confidential reports on all government employees. Manmohan Singh had put ‘reinventing’ governance at the top of his agenda when he took charge as the Prime Minister.

The unfortunate reality is that politicians are in a trap. Chief ministers like Jayalalithaa and Ashok Gehlot took the difficult route of breaking strikes by government servants. They were removed in the elections.

Anecdotal evidence suggests that government employees managing the poll booths had a major role to play in this.

In the result, even an ‘anti-bureaucracy’ crusader like Mayawati is forced to promptly announce the implementation of the Sixth Pay Commission awards. I do not know where the solution lies.

Government employees have become an uncontrollable demon . The public also are unwilling to confront them.

They want to get a ‘government job.’ Instead of opposing the tyranny of government employees, the people seek to join the army of tyrants just as kings rallied around Ravana and Kamsa. One wonders whether it will be necessary for a Rama or Krishna to take birth to deliver the people from this tyranny.

bharatj@sancharnet.in


Source: http://www.expressbuzz.com/