People's Democracy

THE UDF government in Kerala has unleashed a serious attack on the state government employees and teachers in the form of a 13 point programme. Even as resistance has begun against this assault the state government has challenged the employees that it would not bow down to any kind of pressure. The Chief Minister A K Antony has said that even if the government offices remain closed for one month nothing would happen to the state as in the present situation, they were not at all useful to the people. He has tried to justify this assault in the name of improving the state financial position.

The new so called austerity measures initiated by the government has opened a floodgate of protests and struggle through out Kerala. On January 9th State Secretariat employees belonging to all political affiliations virtually besieged the secretariat where any type of demonstration is prohibited. The employees and teachers' organisations went on a state-wide strike on January 10 to warn the government of dire consequences if the new measures are not withdrawn. All organizations have decided to come together against this assault on their livelihood and income. Clearly, Kerala is soon going to be a melting pot of struggles in view of various anti-people decisions being taken by the Antony government including sanctioning of toddy shops to private auctioneers in order to benefit the abkari mafia.

Following is the 13 point programme unleashed by the state government against the employees and teachers :

1. The pension age will not be enhanced.
2. Excess employees would be excluded from work for the coming two years and in the first year they would be given an allowance equivalent to 60 per cent of their basic pay while in the second year it would be reduced to 50 per cent. After this the government would take appropriate measures in their case.
3. All temporary posts would be abolished.
4. From now on any vacancy should be reported to the Public Service Commission only after obtaining government sanction.
5. The protection granted to teachers in uneconomic schools will be stopped once and for all.
6. The college teachers' UGC scales would be limited only to those teachers who work in the UGC pattern.
7. A Voluntary Retirement Scheme would be enunciated and implemented for government employees.
8. Leave surrender is stopped completely.
9. This year no housing loan and vehicle loan would be granted.
10. Pension discount rate would be enhanced from 4.75 per cent to 8.75 per cent. The right to full pension after commutation period expires will delay by three years as the retired employees would get full pension only after a lapse of 15 years. The old aged, retired civil servants will suffer a lot because of this measure.
11. The present pension scheme will be stopped and the new recruits will get pension only through the contributory pension scheme.
12. Higher secondary teachers would get their due salary only from dates on which their posts were created. Till then they would be paid a remuneration equivalent to the one presently received by the guest teachers.
13. The new recruits in the PSUs and the government undertakings would be getting only their basic pay for the first two years as this tenure of two years would be deemed as apprenticeship.

The government claims that these measures would save about Rs 500 crores of government money. It has indicated that it intends to continue this in the following years also. This aggression on employees is being made at a time when the UDF government has sanctioned several concessions to tax evaders, monopoly holders and mafias to the tune of hundreds of crores.

Every day the Anthony government is getting isolated from people with its increasingly anti-people policies. The people of the state are bracing themselves for a widespread struggle to repel these attacks. The starting point may well be this 13 point programme.