Friday, 04 October 2024 | PNS | DEHRADUN
The Pradesh Congress Committee (PCC) president Karan Mahara has demanded immediate restoration of the old pension scheme (OPS) for the State government employees. In a letter to the Prime Minister Narendra Modi, the PCC president said that the government employees have been demanding restoration of the Old Pension Scheme (OPS) for a long time and some States including Rajasthan, Himachal Pradesh, Chhattisgarh and Punjab have accepted their demand. Mahara said that after agriculture sector business enterprises, a large section of the population is dependent on government jobs for livelihood and after retirement, most employees prefer a monthly pension instead of a lump sum for better living. He said that under the OPS, 50 percent salary received by the employees at the time of retirement was given as pension. Apart from the pension the employees also get the benefit of regular increase in their dearness allowance.
Mahara said that the Union government has implemented a unified pension scheme (UPS) against the wishes of the employees. He said that under the UPS, the employees are required to give their contribution in this scheme, whereas the pension in OPS was completely dependent on the social security scheme provided by the government.
“The employees believe that if the government can give the option of New Pension Scheme and Unified Pension Scheme (UPS), then what is the problem with the government in giving the option of Old Pension Scheme (OPS)? We demand that the OPS should be restored in the larger public interest,’’ he said.
