The West Bengal government's second cabinet meeting is scheduled for May 18, where key decisions on Dearness Allowance (DA), implementation of the Seventh Pay Commission, and other administrative issues are expected to be addressed.
Employees of Mumbai's BEST undertaking have launched an indefinite strike, severely impacting public transport and electricity services. The strike, called by a joint action committee, demands budget merger with BMC, settlement of dues, and implementation of the Seventh Pay Commission, among other issues. Despite court orders and MESMA invocation, the strike continues, causing widespread inconvenience to millions of commuters and electricity consumers.
The Brihanmumbai Electric Supply and Transport (BEST) undertaking arranged special bus services for students appearing in the NEET re-examination in Mumbai, deploying 60 buses on 24 routes for approximately 180 trips, despite an ongoing strike by its employees that has paralysed public transport.
BEST employees continued their strike in Mumbai for a second day, causing significant disruption to public transport despite appeals from the Maharashtra Transport Minister and the invocation of MESMA. Commuters were forced to rely on alternative, overcrowded transport options, while the striking unions maintained their demands for budget merger, improved pay, and absorption of contractual workers.
Despite BEST employees calling off their indefinite strike, Mumbai's bus services remained significantly below normal on Monday morning, with only 57% of the scheduled fleet operational. Commuters experienced long waits, leading many to seek alternative transport. The strike ended after an agreement with Deputy CM Eknath Shinde, which included interim pay hikes and commitments for future improvements and clearing dues.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi criticised the ruling TMC in West Bengal, alleging corruption and appeasement politics, while promoting the BJP's development agenda ahead of the assembly elections.
BJP president Nitin Nabin has accused West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee and opposition parties like the Congress for the setback in implementing women's reservation in legislatures.
Kerala, Tamil Nadu and West Bengal have been fiscally stressed for a considerable period of time, and there are no easy ways to mobilise revenues to meet the cost of the promised freebies, particularly in the prevailing difficult economic scenario, points out M Govinda Rao.
Union Minister Sukanta Majumdar criticised West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee's dharna and outlined the BJP's promises for the upcoming assembly elections, including job creation, increased financial assistance for women, and proper DA for state government employees.
The BJP has released its election manifesto for West Bengal, promising a hardline stance on infiltration, financial assistance for women and unemployed youth, and the implementation of the Seventh Pay Commission for state employees.
BJP leader Nitin Nabin accuses the Mamata Banerjee-led TMC government of altering West Bengal's demography by favouring infiltrators and neglecting the rights of the state's residents, promising to rectify the situation if the BJP comes to power.
Defence Minister Rajnath Singh has launched a strong attack on West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee, accusing her government of appeasement politics, encouraging illegal immigration for votes, and leading the state into misrule and corruption.
Union Home Minister Amit Shah accuses the West Bengal government of openly facilitating infiltration, defends the Special Intensive Revision of voter lists, and asserts BJP's prospects in upcoming elections.
Opening up the corner office is fine, but will the government be able to attract talent without giving a market-rate salary?, asks Tamal Bandyopadhyay.
The 7th CPC places the Indian Police Service (and, almost in passing, the Indian Forest Service) on a level with the Indian Administrative Service, leaving the military out in the cold.
'The actions of Indian monetary authorities will depend on how quickly they want the inflation to come down to 4 per cent.'
The state has close to 280,000 employees and 180,000 pensioners.
Officials cited the example of the Sixth Pay Commission.
The Commission will now have time until December 31 to submit its report.
The current salary paid by the Delhi government amounts to 17 per cent of the total expenditure.
Over 100 workers of the MSRTC had staged the protest outside 'Silver Oak', Pawar's bungalow on Pedder Road in south Mumbai on Friday afternoon, catching the police unawares.
Maharashtra minister and NCP leader Nawab Malik on Thursday accused NCB's zonal director Sameer Wankhede and his family of obtaining two separate certificates of his mother following her death in 2015, each mentioning her as Muslim and Hindu.
The 79-year old veteran leader, who has already announced his retirement from electoral politics, said there is no question of him sitting at home, and after the assembly session he will tour the state and campaign for the party and its candidates.
Demands include 5-day banking, PF to be calculated on total salary and allowances, not only on basic
The Seventh Pay Commission had decided to choose the CPI-IW as the index for adjusting inflation for central government employees.
As the MPC is mandated to target CPI inflation rate at 4 plus minus 2 per cent, any measurement error in CPI is likely to have grave consequences for monetary policy.
The Centre is expected to increase the dearness allowance by 10% to 100% by the end of February.
Prez said basic pension of ex-servicemen of the Indian Army has increased by 2.57 times as compared to pension of December 31, 2015.
'The non-implementation of the Seventh Pay Commission, almost a year after it was implemented for civilians, is gradually beginning to hurt morale in the armed forces,' says Brigadier Gurmeet Kanwal (retd).
The Railways is expected to mobilise a substantial chunk of funds through dynamic pricing.
He said Parrikar had no right or authority to order the services chiefs to accept what is not acceptable to them, adding he had once again shown his inability to understand the services.
State employees in Karnataka will have to wait longer for wage hike.
State governments want the Centre to direct the 14th Finance Commission to compensate states for implementing pay scales, to be recommended by the pay panel.
Home and kitchen appliances, electronic products, apparel and B-segment cars stand to gain.
Madhya Pradesh has nearly 750,000 employees who would share the benefit of the pay hike.
The challenge of cleaning up the taxation system and introducing the goods and services tax (GST) regime cannot be underestimated.
The Bharatiya Janata Party on Sunday unveiled its manifesto for the West Bengal elections, promising to build a 'Sonar Bangla' by providing employment, strengthening social security schemes and vowing to clear the implementation of the Citizenship Amendment Act in the first cabinet meeting of the new government.
This time, five states, including Tamil Nadu, have requested the Centre to delay the pay hikes.
The amount constitutes 45 per cent of the railways' total wage bill.
