Hyderabad: What does anyone do when faced with a financial crunch? Delay payments due, and postpone events which demand a big cheque to be issued.
The Telangana state government has, after seriously exploring ways out of the financial muddle it finds itself in the middle of, devised such a way. As part of a slew of measures to avert a furthering of the crisis, the finance department has proposed to Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao to consider enhancement of the retirement age of government employees from 58 years to 61 years, saying, it was promised during the Assembly elections campaign by the party.
The enhancement of retirement age could pave the way for the government to save at least Rs 2,500 crore per annum for the next few years, sources close to the finance department said.
An officer in the finance department, on condition of anonymity, explained that on an average, 900 employees retire in a month. Based on their cadre, they would be eligible to get retirement benefits ranging from Rs 14 lakh to Rs 30 lakh.
If the retirement age is enhanced, the government would prevent an immediate cash outflow of Rs 250 crore to Rs 265 crore per month. Since the proposal is to enhance the retirement age by three years, the government would have issued a moratorium on payment to the tune of Rs 7,500 crore to Rs 8,200 crore.
Sources in the finance department felt the proposal was a case of one stone two birds. The existing government employees would be happy while the government would avert the burden of paying retirement emoluments to employees for the next three years.
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While the final decision lies with Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao, who is keen to implementing his poll welfare promises, in particular enhanced amounts under Asara pensions for senior citizens and the Rythu Bandhu scheme, which requires a lot of money, he has little choice but to accept the proposal, sources added.
Sources said that due to economic slowdown in the country, there would be a considerable decrease in both the devolution funds and grants from the Centre.
Some officials, however, are apprehending a strong opposition to move, especially from the unemployed youth against the move.
After the state bifurcation, 3.70 lakh employees were allocated to Telangana state. The government provided an additional employment to 1.17 lakh people over the last five years. The department estimates that there were about 4.40 lakh government employees working in all departments, minus the 60,000 employees who retired since the formation of the state.
The enhancement of retirement age would also affect promotions of employees and impact creation of new vacancies, sources pointed out.
But senior officers exude confidence that the Chief Minister would accept their proposal and enhance retirement age, and mitigate public anger by additionally announcing notifications for new recruitment to fill existing vacancies.
