ALL INDIA RMS & MMS EMPLOYEES UNION ,GROUP'C' AP CIRCLE

Tuesday, 16 April 2019

CONSIDERING TRANSFER UNDER RULE 38 AGAINST VACANCIES REPORTED FOR FILLING THROUGH DIRECT RECRUITMENT EXAMINATION CONDUCTED BY STAFF SELECTION COMMISSION (Click the link below to view)

http://utilities.cept.gov.in/dop/pdfbind.ashx?id=3393

NATIONAL COUNCIL MEETING HELD ON 13-04-2019 DISCUSSION ON IMPORTANT POINTS

Tuesday, 9 April 2019

Monday, 8 April 2019

NCCPA Resolution on General Elections!

NCCPA SECRETARIAT ON GENERAL ELECTIONS

The National Secretariat of NCCPA, which met at New Delhi on 16^th March, 2019 while reviewing its efforts in the last five years getting the Government to address the issues, concerns, grievances and demands of Central Govt. Pensioners came to the conclusion that the nugatory attitude of the Government in power at the Centre was the root cause of not finding resolution to any of the issues. It was so disappointing for the entire Pensioner community that the Government chose to crush their expectation for a decent pension raised by the recommendation of the 7^th Central Pay Commission by rejecting the Option No. 1 on the specious ground that it was not feasible to be implemented due to the non availability of records in the case of a minor segment of them. The recommendation, if accepted, would have brought about the much sought after parity between the past and present pensioners.

The meeting noted with dismay and anger that during the five year period, the NDA under the BJP was in power they had acted contrary to the directive principles enshrined in the constitution of the country i.e. to provide justice to the people, social , economic and political. It had continued with the hated neo-liberal economic policies, the change of which was the ardent hope of the people when they voted them to power in 2014. The UPA-2 regime’s adherence to these policies, discarding the welfare scheme evolved by the successive post independent governments of the country, which had been the greatest source of sustenance of the poor people; permitting the unhindered foray of private enterprises in every sphere of economic and industrial activities; the rampant corruption were the significant concerns of the Indian multitude in 2014. They expected a change, a change that will bring about deliverance from abject poverty and hunger. They were disappointed and are despondent.

The Central Government employees and pensioners know well how this government took decisions on the recommendations of the 7^th CPC. There had been no negotiation at all- a complete departure from what had been the practice hitherto. Assurances held out to force withdrawal of the indefinite strike slated to commence in July, 2016 was never honoured. Not even once the group of Ministers met the union representatives, thereafter. The JCM which was set up as a forum for effecting negotiation with the employees never met even once during the Modi regime. Even small issues, which has a bearing only over a very small segment of the employees were not addressed. Only those benefits the higher echelons in the bureaucracy received consideration and favourable nod. The employees were dragged to litigation and there had been an eruption of petitions before the Courts. Contrary to its own directive not to prefer appeal over the verdicts of the Administrative Tribunals, this Government had been preferring even writ petitions against the Tribunal’s orders as a matter of routine, derailing the process of an expeditious justice delivery system. This attitude resulted in the litigants ( who are often pensioners or low paid employees) to shell out enormous amounts to plead their cases before Courts to seek justice. Even after such procrastinated and inhuman journey, the Government either will not act upon these judgements or restrict the application of those judgements only to those who were the petitioners in the court. This has been the gruelling story of pensioners and employees in the last five years. Never in the history of wage negotiations the Government especially in the matter of pension had taken recourse to rejection of a recommendation made by the Pay Commission. Before the Courts, the Government avers that the recommendations of the Pay commissions are to be treated as one that has emanated from an expert body after deliberations of all pros and cons. The opinion No. 1 was conceived by the Commission to bring in parity between the past and present pensioners in real terms. It was rejected on the malicious ground that it was not feasible to implement in the absence of relevant records. It was admitted unashamedly that the records were available in 86%of the cases and in the rest of the cases supplementary evidences could be collected to operationalise Option No 1. It is not difficult to discern the real reason behind such rejection as the said recommendation was not providing the requisite benefit for the personnel in organised Group A services, as they are favoured with a time-bound promotion scheme throughout their service career. The alternate suggestion made by the Committee headed by the Secretary Pension was to benefit the very same personnel in Group A services. It was strange that even the most sensible suggestion put forth by the Staff Side to offer all the three options to the Pensioners were summarily rejected.

Throughout the five year reign, this Government had been pursuing crony capitalism. The decision taken just before the announcement of the elections to hand over the six Indian Airports to private influential Group of companies is a befitting example. The country had been going through a continuous period of crisis, be it in agriculture, farm prices, industry, trade or employment. Farm income has crashed to its lowest levels against the poll promise of doubling it; rural wage growth was abysmally poor at 0.5%, unemployment has risen to the highest peak in the last 45 years as per CME, whose report has been concealed; the money collected over the sale of PSU shares had been doubled in the five years; all constitutional institutions were subjected to attack eroding its autonomy; resurgence of corruption in defence deals involving crores; indulgence in jingoistic nationalism to garner votes; to put faith beyond the pale of constitutional law and above all systematic disruption of the social harmony had been some of the hall-marks of the present Government in its five year long governance.

The meeting thus came to the inescapable conclusion that a relook into the issues concerning the working people and pensioners would become possible only and only if a change is brought about by replacing the present people in the governance of the country . The inevitable democratic process for which the country is committed to, provides an opportunity to its citizens to make a change every five years. The coming two months will witness a fierce battle between those who want to retain the power and those who want to stop them at all costs. The meeting decided to appeal all its members to strive hard through diligent exercise of their franchise enlisting the support of all sections of the working class to bring about a change of Government in the country in the coming elections.

The state of economy and society

After the five years of NDA regime

1. During these five years every area of economic activity has been opened up for direct foreign investment promoting maximisation of profit by them

2. Large scale of privatisation of public assets and handing over prime assets to chosen foreign and Indian corporates.

3. Unfettered promotion of crony capitalism as reflected in the Rafale scam, the granting of rights to privatise domestic airports , India’s first power sector SEZ to the Adani Group on the eve of election, removing all previous curbs on funding political parties , introduction of electoral bonds as the route to reap the spoils of such cronyism,

4. Facilitating and promoting the loot of public money as reflected in the Rs.11 lakh crore plus amount of NPA.

5. Destruction of livelihood of corers of people surviving on cash transactions through demonetisation.

6. Virtual destruction of the micro small and medium enterprises the largest employment provider after agriculture through the implementation of the GST. The Mudra loan NPAs rose to 53per cent in the first nine months of 2018-19 from 2017-18.

7. Farm income crashed to the lowest in 14 years during the last quarter of October-December, 2018 at 2.67 per cent (Central Statistics Office) RBI reports that loans that are not returned in the farm sector increased to Rs; 1lakh crore in September, 2018 from Rs. 70000 crores in September,2017.This is the level of agrarian distress leading to rising distress suicides of farmers.

8. Our youth are frustrated due to the sharp fall in employment opportunities during the last few years. Modi had promised creation of 2 crore new jobs annually i;e. 10 crores by now. Reality is that the unemployment rate rose to the highest levels in 45 years at 6.1. per cent. (NSSo) Unemployment rate inFeb.2019 increased to 7.1. per cent from 5.9 per cent in 2018 (Centre for Monitoring Indian Economy) Situation in rural India is worse. NSSSO reports a 3.2.crore job loss of casual labourers from 2011-12 to 2017-18 affecting over1.5 crore families dependent on income from Casual labour and agriculture.

9. As per the Gujarat Assembly records, the crime against SC and ST increased by 32% and 55% respectively during the last five years in that state.

10. Women have been subjected to increased violence. The year 2016 reported a big increase in crimes against women- four rapes on an average per hour. Since then the Government has stopped publishing statistics by the National crime records bureau in this regard.

11. During these five years the share of the total wealth accruing to the top one per cent of the population increased from 49 per cent in 2014 to 73 per cent in 2018.

12. The lowest growth rate of GDP during these five years from.8.2 per cent in 2013-14 to 7percent in the first three quarters of 2018-19 even according to the motivated data series introduced by the Government. According to the earlier data series this stands at mere 4.7 percent.

13. In the last quarter, the GDP growth rate fell further to6.6 per cent indicating that the economy is sliding into a recession. So much for Modi’s claims of India being the “fastest growing economy” in the world.

14. GST collection despite all the tall claims shown steady decline from 7.6 per cent in 2017-18 to 5.8 per cent in 2018-19. This reflect a massive slowdown in the economy.

15. Demonetisation and GST were a double whammy attack undermining the country’s economic fundamentals. Pre-demonetisation global GDP was 2.6 per cent and grew post demonetisation to 3.1.percent. In contrast, the post demonetisation India’s GDP growth fell from. 7.6 per cent to 6.8 per cent.

16. Destruction of people’s livelihood has led to a drastic fall in levels of domestic demand crippling manufacturing and industrial growth. As a consequence, the country’s leading automobile manufacturer, Maruti Suzuki has announced a production cut of 27 per cent citing the fall in demand. The eight core infrastructure industries growth saw a decline of 2.9 per cent between February, 2014 and January, 2019. The index of industrial production registered an abysmal low of 0.3 percent inNovember,2018 compared to an average growth of 5.7 per cent in the preceding seven month.

17. Depreciation of rupee to its lowest levels- the value of the rupee to a US dollar was 63.19in 2014. This shot to71.76 in 2019 .

18. Drastic fall in India’s export earnings – Between Feb.2014 and January, 2019 India’s trade balance declined by whopping 29.8per cent. Growing current account deficit ie. Gap between India’s export and Import value has been registered during these five years. The current account deficit increased from 1 per cent of the GDP in 201718 to. 2.9 per centin 2018-19. In dollar terms this translates into deficit growth from 6.1. billion US dollars to 19.1. billion.

19. Agriculture growth is at a record low during these years. Agricultural growth rate fell from 5.1. percent to 2.7 per cent and further to 1.7per cent between Feb. 2015 and Feb,2019(CSO) The fourth successive negative growth rate registered in the last four quarters.

20. The incidents of terror have exponentially gown between 2009-14 and 2014-19. The number of terrorist attacks increased from 109 to 626. The number of security personnel killed increased from 139 to 483. The number of civilians killed increased from 12 to 210 and the number of ceasefire violations increased from 563 to 5596.

21. There is an alarming rise in the number of local youth joining militant groups. Local militants killed rose from 16 in2014 to 191 in 2018.

22. Foreign policy orientation changed to dovetail to US global strategic interests reducing India as a junior partner of US imperialism.

23. Deterioration of friendly relations with all neighbouring countries.

24. Deepening defence ties with USA and Israel.

25. Virtual abandonment of India’s leadership role in the non- aligned movement.

26. Abandoning India’s traditional solidarity with the people of different countries whose sovereignty is being attacked by US Imperialism including military interventions. The latest instance being Venezuela.

27. During these five years, the BJP , particularly Narendra Modi has betrayed every single promise that was made to the Indian people. Generation of two crore jobs every year i.e. ten crores by now and MSP of 1.5. times the total cost of production to the farmers, return of black money and depositing 15 lakhs in the account of all Indians and so on.

28. Engaging in a despicable politicising of the issue of terrorist attacks when the entire country and all opposition parties stood as one to fight terrorism.

29. Sharp decline in the working conditions for the working class and employees is accompanied by unbearable hike in the price of petroleum products with the Government refusing to reduce its taxes and duties.

30. Deepening agrarian distress leading to the ruination of the Indian farmers and growth in distress suicides.

Friday, 5 April 2019

Wednesday, 6 March 2019

APPEAL

ALL CIRCLE/DIVISIONAL AND BRANCH SECRETARIES OF NFPE UNIONS

PLEASE CONDUCT ONE DAY DHARNA ON 07^thMARCH-2019 AS NOTIFIED AT ALL DIVISIONAL HEADQUARTERS FOR SETTLEMENT OF 24 POINT CHARTER OF DEMAND.

R.N. PARASHAR

SECRETARY GENERAL

NFPE

MESSAGE OF INTERNATIONAL WOMEN’S DAY

Usha Bonepalli

bonepalliusha@gmail.com

Type of ship : A small mini-ship.

Location : Highseas, in the South Pacific Ocean.

Between Lyttelton (New Zealand) and Falkland Islands (Argentina)

Climate : Rough weather, stormy winds, extremely cold climate.

Ocean waves of 7 metres height.

Wind speed of 60 knots (i.e. 112 km/s – speed of Rajdhani express)

Nearest port : 5000 kms away, on both sides, at least 20 days to reach.

Crew : Only six members on the mini ship.

Comrades, this is not a story of fiction. And I am not talking about a voyage of Magellan, about whom we studied in history text books, as the first person who sailed around the world. I am talking about 6 women, who sailed around the world, in a small ship, from Sep 2017 to May 2018. Braving storms on high seas in treacherous oceans. The total strength of crew is 6, and all 6 are women. Vartika Joshi, Pratibha Jamwal, AishwaryaBoddapati, P Swathi, S Vijaya Devi, Payal Gupta. These 6 women sailed on INSV Tarini and circumnavigated the world in 9 months. Let me repeat, only 6 crew members on the ship, all 6 are women.

This display of nerves of steel, steely resolve, resolute determination, determined steadfastedness – these are attributes that each and every woman is born with. Except that these qualities are not recognized. Even by herself.

As the famous story goes, an eagle’s egg was placed with hen’s eggs and hatched. Eagle baby grew up with hens, thinking that it is a hen. When it sees an eagle flying high, it thinks –if God blesses, I will be born as an eagle in next birth.

A woman is conditioned to think that she does not have the bouquet of abilities that she is born with. Stereotypes are created, projecting women as weak, meek, fragile, dependent, and delicate. In households, peer groups, societies, films, advertisements, mass media, and every facet of life that women encounter - as a budding girl, a teenager, a young lady and a woman. It gives immense satisfaction when women break these stereotypes, and emerge as courageous, path breaking icons.

There is no shortage of such path breaking icons. On Jan 4 2019, when Arunima Sinha climbed Mount Vinson in dead-chilly Antarctica, she covered all the highest peaks in all seven continents. She is an amputee, lost her leg when she was pushed from running train while she fought robbers. She was also the 1^st female amputee in the world to scale Mount Everest.

Justice Indu Malhotra became the 1^st woman judge to be elevated as a Judge to Supreme Court directly from the Bar. For the 1^st time, we have three women Judges in the Supreme Court. Flight Lieutenant Avani Chaturvedi became the 1^st Indian woman pilot to fly solo in a MiG-21 Bison fighter jet. ManikaBatra led India to gold in Table Tennis in the 2018 Commonwealth games, defeating Singapore, which never lost in Commonwealth games since table tennis was introduced in 2002. She was featured on cover of July 2018 Femina.

Indra Nooyi became 1^st independent female director of International Cricket Council(ICC). Debjani Ghosh became 1^st woman President of NASSCOM, organisation which champions the $ 167 billion Indian IT services industry. Anny Divya from Vijayawada became world’s youngest woman commander to fly a Boeing 777. Himadas, daughter of a farmer from Assam, became 1^st Indian sprinter to win a gold medal at an international track event. She is India’s 1^st ever youth ambassador of UNICEF. Jayshree Ullal, CEO & President of Arista Networks, is one of just 72 self made women billionaires globally. For the 1^st time, an all women contingent of Assam Rifles, oldest paramilitary force in the country, walked down Rajpath on Republic Day 2019, led by Major Khusboo Kanwar, daughter of a bus conductor in Rajasthan.

We need to recount, applaud and celebrate these icons, who broke the stereotypes, and proved that women can excel in any given field. Many of them came from middle class and poor livelihoods. But today, they are rich trailblazers to a generation of young eager women trying to explore their potential, trying to make a mark in the world, in their individual fields.

It is this trail that is the theme for this year’s International Women’s Day, as given by UN Women: THINK EQUAL, BUILD SMART, INNOVATE FOR CHANGE.

The motto of THINK EQUAL is what churned the organised working women movements around the world. Historically, women are not paid equal pay to equal work. Even today, in the words of Chidi King, Director of the Equality Department of the International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC), the main international trade union organization representing the interests of working people worldwide, and a member of UN Women and ILO’s Equal Pay Champions initiative, women across the world still get paid 23 per cent less than men. From ages, women kept waging struggles against such discrimination, but these struggles were routinely ignored or crushed. The exploitation did not weigh them down, it made them think, made them organised. One of the first sparks flew at Massachusetts in 1834.

Women workers at Lowell Cotton Mills in Massachusetts worked for 14 hrs per day. The working conditions were filthy, there was no ventilation, they worked in confinement, noise, and the air was filled with lint. The wages were 1/3rd as compared to men. When these wages were also cut, they felt enough is enough, they organized and went on strike. Women in several other mills joined them. Management crushed the strike within a week, but it stood out as the first organised women workers’ movement in history.

In 1836, when management of the same Lowell Textile Mills announced a rent hike to be paid by textile workers living in company boarding houses, the female textile workers formed Lowell Factory Girls Association and organised a strike. This went on weeks, and eventually, Board of Directors withdrew the rate hike.

In 1945, the workers started Lowell Female Labour Reform association, which was the first working women’s association. It was started with 12 operatives, but membership grew to 500 in 6 months, and continued to expand rapidly. The association was run completely by women, held their own meetings, set up branches in other mill towns. They ran huge petition campaigns and political action, asking the Massachussets state legislature to cap working hours in mills at 10 hours. In 1847, New Hampshire became the 1st state to pass a 10 hour working day. This was the first success for organized working women in any part of the world. This success fuelled organized women movements throughout the world’s working class. Today, we remember that struggle with a sense of pride and honour.

The first National Women’s Day was held in NewYork in 1909 to commemorate the 1908 garments workers strike. On 8th March 1908, 15000 women garment workers marched through Union Square to demand economic and political rights. The three month strike against Triangle Shirtwaist and other mills became hugely successful. This success was celebrated throughout Europe and Soviet. Clara Zeitkin, a German socialist proposed designating a day as ‘International Women’s Day’ at International Socialist Congress in Copenhagen in 1910. From 1911, we are observing International Women’s Day. From 1975, UNO began celebrating International Women’s Day on March 8th.

Comrades, it is because of such glorious struggles in all parts of world that we could secure statutory framework that protect from discrimination against women.

The Convention concerning Equal Remuneration for Men and Women Workers for Work of Equal Value, or Equal Remuneration Convention was framed by the ILO in 1951. The Convention on Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW), was adopted in 1979 by the UN General Assembly. It is often described as an international bill of rights for women.India is a signatory to both.

Movements of working women have also ensured that statutory safeguards were included in Maternity Benefit Act 1961, Factories Act 1948, Equal Remuneration Act 1976, Sexual Harassment of Women at Workplace (Prevention, Prohibition and Redressal) Act 2013 etc. None of these acts were made by way of compassion, but were a result of prolonged struggle of the working women.

After struggling through restricted opportunities in education and employment, having to work 24 x 365 as a mother, wife, sister, daughter, having to run to office after attending to household chores and run back from office to attend house chores again, balancing multiple roles, the least a woman expects is respect in workplace. If she is subjected to sexual harassment, there is nothing more cruel than that. But it is everybody’s knowledge that women are subject to sexual harassment of varying degrees, in varying forms, and they are expected to comply or be silent. It is only in 2013 that the latest Act against sexual harassment at workplace was passed. It was not passed out of voluntary compassion, but as a result of protracted legal struggle resulting in Supreme Court issuing guidelines in the Visakha case. We should keep this in mind that nothing could be achieved unless we organize and wage struggles. We should realize that, though the working women’s movement has achieved significant results, there is a significant lot more to be achieved.

As working women, as much as we are concerned about our working conditions, we are as much concerned about our girl children and fellow women in society, and obstacles they face in their journey to emancipation. The obstacles to equal emancipation are many. If we look at some trends, among students who stopped studies after primary education, 70% are females. Most of the girls are not facilitated to study till higher education. If family size increases, schooling will be provided to boys, girls are compelled to drop out. These conditions result in lack of education, which leads to lack of opportunities. If such obstacles to education are removed, evidence shows thatwomen excel exceedingly. In a report published by American Enterprise Institute (AEI), for a ninth time in a row, women earned more doctoral degrees (Ph.Ds) awarded at US Universities in 2017, than men. Though this is a matter of satisfaction to show that women will excel given a chance, yet a detailed analysis shows the effect of stereotypes: the ratio of Ph.Ds between men and women is 75 : 25 in Maths and Computer Science, 76 : 24 in Engineering. The ratio is 39 : 61 in social and behavioural sciences, 31 : 69 in education, 30 : 70 in health sciences. In the technology areas of maths, engineering, computer science, women Ph.Ds are very less. In health sciences too, we have more women in dental, physiotherapy, gynaecology, obstetrics etc. In niche and high visible areas women are conspicuous by their absence. Women are not into specialities like cardiology, oncology, orthopaedic surgery. Remember when you have heard about a female cardiologist who did an angioplasty or a bypass surgery?In areas regarded are technologically superior, even today, women do not find encouragement to enter, mainly because of stereotyping. Women have a long way to go, to unshackle these stereotypes that women are suitable for such and such jobs only. Women need to think that they are eagles, and fly high.

Women not only have to THINK EQUAL, they need to BUILD SMART.This aspect of BUILD SMART is more critical in these times of revolutionary changes in technology. We need to see more and more women talking enthusiastically about Internet of Things, Cryptocurrency, Blockchain, Data Mining, Cyber Security, Cloud Computing, Machine Learning -the future of employment is in sectors like these. These new technologies are called ‘disruptors’. They disrupt the way we work. The skills, the technologies, the methods, that we are using in our workplace are suddenly becoming defunct. We see boys flocking to computer institutes to learn these skills. Unless girls focus on BUILD SMART i.e., building such skills smartly, there will be a huge gender gap in employment.Men will be doing all technologically suave jobs which pay more, and women will be relegated to less paying non-tech jobs. In this context, the UN Women motto of THINK EQUAL, BUILD SMART AND INNOVATE FOR CHANGE is compellingly relevant.

Today is the day to think about the road traveled and about the road to be traveled. Working women’s movement made spectacular advances, we are proud of it. At the same time, we are also vigilant about the challenges. We are conscious of the frame work to achieve that :

a. Maintain a gender parity mindset (question any lack of women’s participation, identify alternatives that are more inclusive, nominate women for opportunities, always include and support women, think 50/50 as goal),

b. Challenge stereotypes and bias (question assumptions about women, challenge statements that limit women, always use inclusive language, work to remove barriers to women’s progress, buy from retailers who position women in positive ways),

c. Forge positive visibility of women (identify ways to make women more visible, extend opportunities to women first, assume women want opportunities until declined, select women as spoke-persons and leaders, support visible women),

d. Influence others’ beliefs/actions (supportively call-out inappropriate behavior, campaign for equality in meaningful ways, lead by example via inclusive actions, be a role model for equality, actively contribute to change the status quo) and;

e. Celebrate women’s achievements (believe achievement comes in many forms, value women’s individual and collective success, ensure credit is given for women’s contributions, celebrate women role models and their journeys, support awards showcasing women’s success).

As Chairperson of the Women’s Committee of Confederation of Central Government Employees and Workers, I am confident that we will realize and release the eagle in us. Hearty fraternal wishes for a happy, cheerful and dynamic International Women’s Day 2019.

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REIMBURSEMENT OF RENT TO GOVERNMENT SERVANTS DURING THEIR TEMPORARY STAY - REG

Reimbursement of rent to Government servants during their temporary Stay ( upto a maximum period of six months) in State Bhawans/Guest Houses/Guest Houses/Departmental Guest Houses run by Central Government/State Governments/Autonomous organizations etc.
To view Directorate memo no. 4-2/2015-PAP dated 5.3.2019, please CLICK HERE.

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GRANT OF EXTRA WORK ALLOWANCE - DECISION OF THE GOVERNMENT ON THE RECOMMENDATION OF THE 7TH CPC

Grant of Extra Work Allowance-(abolition of existing Caretaking Allowance, Extra Duty Allowance, Flag Station Allowance, Flight Charge Certificate Allowance, Library Allowance, Rajbhasha Allowance and Special Appointment Allowance)-decision of the Government on the Recommendation of the Seventh Central Pay Commission(7th CPC).
To view, Directorate memo No. 5-1/2017-PAP dated 5.3.2019, please CLICK HERE.