Dimapur, June 2 (MExN): Senior government officials of the Nagaland secretariat services have cautioned of policy hazards contained in the standing demand for reviewing the superannuation age of government employees. The officials met on May 27 and deliberated at length the issue of the length of service for retirement. The members are said to have expresses unhappiness at the proposal of the government.
It was informed that the same issue was brought up during the UDF government in 1992 enforcing premature retirement from service at 33 years of service (or 57 years of age).Mercifully, during that time, the decision was struck down by the High Court in 1993.
Another attempt to “please the younger generation” was made when the government tried to implement its decision and cancel the high court’s order. However, again the high court intervened with an order against the state government’s action. The ad-hoc action committee for state employees “affected by length of service” today issued a statement urging every government employee to stand by the 1993 judgment of the high court. The government on its part is urged to review its stance on the proposed bill.
The affected employees explained the nature of the loopholes in the superannuation policy if at all it is changed as demanded by certain sections. The officials explained that the proposed plan is not at all acceptable or applicable concept for the very fact that the “bill” falls only on low-income groups like grade-IV and ministerial employees who are from the rural areas. During the 1960s and 1970s parents were illiterate and due to dire financial reasons, most employees entered government service while studying in night schools and colleges. In brief, most of the affected senior government employees entered service at the age of 18 to 22 years of age. So if the length of service of 33 years is implemented, most of the servants will retire at the age of 51 to 55 years. This stipulated equation holds equivalence even for those who enter service at 19 (retirement at 51 years of age) or even 23 years (retirement at 56), it was reminded.
Another factor that the officials pointed out was that, members from “advanced tribes” entered services at the age of 20 to 23 years after pre-university or the bachelors. However, due to relaxation of educational qualifications to the “backward tribes’ they were recruited at the age of 18 to 20 years after matriculation or pre-university, it was pointed out. This means that most of the affected employees are grade-IV workers or are from the backward tribes, the secretariat organization added.
A similar disturbing cause for worry that the officials pointed out was that children of affected employees would suffer as they depend on their parents’ salary alone. ‘If premature retirement is enforced, most of the students who are studying outside the state will have to return to Nagaland and “create more problems than the present situation is”’, the employees explained. The government is appealed to by the affected government employees “not to behind (sic) our sons and daughters who are blindly demanding sweets without thinking that it will damage their stomach.”
