7th Pay Commission – Recommends Abolition of 52 Allowances

7th Pay Commission – Recommends Abolition of 52 Allowances – The list of outdated government perks is pretty long. Sample this: select postal department employees are entitled to a Rs 90-per month cycle allowance.

The 7th Pay Commission, headed by Justice Ashok Kumar Mathur submitted its report to the finance ministry about 10 days back. It has made many recommendations to the Government pertaining to salary, pension etc., etc. It has also recommended abolition of 52 allowances that the 7th Pay Commission found obsolete.

The list of outdated government perks is pretty long. Sample this: select postal department employees are entitled to a Rs 90-per month cycle allowance, if the employee fulfills a number of conditions including the submission of proof that there has been an “extensive use” of the bicycle. Indian Foreign Service officers are given a monetary incentive that’s ridiculously low for learning an optional foreign language — Rs 100 per month if the officer turns “proficient” in that language and Rs 200 per month if the officer becomes “above proficient”.

Sounds odd, but Central Industrial Security Force (CISF) personnel receive a haircutting allowance at the rate of Rs 5 per month, the lowest among 196 government allowances that prevail today. This allowance should have been discarded long ago, as haircutting is very much a part of the CISF cadres’ composite personal maintenance allowance. But no one probably had spotted this till the 7th Central Pay Commission found it “outdated” and recommended its abolition.

So, when the 7th Central Pay Commission chairman Justice AK Mathur along with two members of the Commission had to evaluate the demands of IAS, IFS, IPS, Central government services and defence personnel in several rounds of meetings spanning nearly two years, they encountered a humongous task of rationalising as many as 196 allowances in addition to weighing in on the core issues of pay hike and pay parity. The list of allowances includes the well-known ones like DA and HRA.

And the Central Pay Commission, which submitted its report 10 days ago to the finance ministry, clearly recommended abolition of 52 allowances that they found obsolete. We give below a selected list of a few allowances which have been recommended for abolition:

1. Hair cutting Allowance
2. Cash Handling Allowance
3. Hutting Allowance
4. Secret Allowance
5. Cycle Allowance
6. Diet Allowance
7. Soap Toilet Allowance
8. Funeral Allowance

Source: The Economic Times