KASARGOD : Finance Minister T M Thomas Issac’s Islamic Bank may still be in the hatchery, but he has soft launched an initiative - primarily aiming at the government employees from the Muslim community and might give a boost to the state exchequer.
On the Service and Payroll Administrative Repository for Kerala (SPARK) - the establishment’s online interface - a new option has been introduced for the employees to forego interest on the 2014 pay revision arrears and other bills.
The option is available under the tab Salary Matter, Pay Revision 2014, which will take the user to the link ‘Employees not interested to receive interest’.
The official has to enter the name of the department, office, DDO code, and the bill type for which he/she prefers not to receive interest.
The trade unions affiliated to both the Muslim League and the Congress welcomed the move.
The State Employees Union (SEU), the trade organisation affiliated to the IUML, said the initiative could be a desperate attempt to shore up the finances but providing such an option to employees was a welcome initiative. “We welcome the option to forego the interest.
Till now many employees did not have a choice,” said Nasar Nangarath, state secretary, State Employees Union. He said the option could attract all the employees.
The Congress-affiliated Kerala Non-Gazetted Officers Association’s Kasargod district president M P Kunhi Moideen said several employees have been using the interest from arrears and PF for charity.
He, however, said the government “desperately” needed money. “The LDF Government had earlier slashed the interest rate on arrears from 2014 pay revision to 8% from 8.7%,” he said.
The LDF Government had also gone back on the January 2016 order to pay the arrears in cash in four equal tranches.
“Now, the Finance Minister says the money will be transferred to the General Provident Fund (GPF).
“Even the process to transfer the money was set in place on Saturday (April 22) when it should have been done on April 1,” he said.
Express on Saturday had carried a report on the delay in activating the module to transfer the arrears to the GPF.