Employees of various government departments, affiliated to Tamil Nadu Government Employees Association (TNEGA), observed fast in Tirupur on Thursday to press their charter of demands pertaining to wage increase and social security benefits.
TNEGA State vice-president Peter Barnabas said main demand of the employees was that the State Government should immediately disclose the contents of the report submitted by the one-man commission which looked into the complaints of anomalies in the revised pay structure of state government employees in line with the Sixth Central Pay Commission.
The commission under Rajeev Ranjan, the Principal Secretary to the State Government and a senior IAS officer, examined the demands of the State government staff for hike in house rent allowance to the tune of 30 percent in the case of those employed at Chennai, 20 percent for the employees working in Madurai and Coimbatore cities and 10 percent for the remaining officials, among others.
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The TNEGA employees also wanted educational allowance at the rate of Rs. 1,000 a month for their child each and the interest on General Provident Fund raised back to 12 percent.
The agitators asked the State Government to stop the practice of deploying retired employees for various posts lying vacant on contract basis.
"Instead, make fresh recruitments enabling job opportunities for the educated youth," they said.
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Mr Barnabas said that steps should be taken to fill in the two lakh vacancies existing in the government sector without any further delay.
TNEGA district president D. Rajagopalan spoke.