7th Pay Commission: Goa decides to implement salary hike proposals ahead of elections

The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) seems to have taken a lead over others in poll-bound Goa with its pay bonanza to state government employees. On Thursday, Chief Minister Laxmikant Parsekar declared that the recommendations of the 7th Central Pay Commission (CPC) will be implemented by the state before next month.

"All the procedures for the implementation of the seventh pay commission for the state government workers have been completed. We will place the file before Cabinet during the ensuing week or week after that. After that the notification would be issued," Parsekar told reporters on Thursday, according to PTI.

"Goa will be going for polls soon and the question of hurting or upsetting any section of society does not arise. We have assured to implement and we will do it," he added.

The announcement comes as a pre-emptive measure since the Goa Government Employees Association (GGEA) had decided to go on strike on December 7 and informed the state government accordingly last week.

Goa goes to polls early next year to elect representatives for its 40-member assembly.

The state government had allocated Rs 2,553 crore for salaries and pensioners for the financial year 2016-17, as against Rs 1,946 crore in the previous fiscal, to accommodate the additional outgo arising out of the impending implementation of the CPC for its employees, Parsekar had earlier informed the Goa Legislative Assembly in August this year.

"We have decided to implement the recommendations of Seventh Pay Commission from November 1 onwards. The pending arrears from January to October 2016 would be deposited in the employee provident fund (PF) and National Pension System (NPS)," Parsekar had said, according to another PTI report.

Last month, the Odisha government had decided to implement the recommendations of the CPC, a move that will benefit about four lakh employees and approximately three lakh pensioners of the state.

The Odisha government's annual salary bill of Rs 29,800 crore would increase by about Rs 5,000 crore on account of the implementation of the CPC recommendations.