NEW DELHI: A bureaucrat from the Indian Postal Service has likened the IAS lobby’s attempts to maintain its superiority as far as pay packets are concerned to casteism. “In fact, it is the backlog of British Raj when the ICS carried the supreme chip on their shoulders,’’ he said.
The IAS “lobby’’ is up in arms against any move to bring about pay parity among the services. They say the demand for equal pay is arising out of “inferiority complex”.
They are of the view that all those who are demanding equal pay are the ones who tried desperately for the IAS but could not make it. “Those who have failed to make it to the top will always carry this ill feeling towards the winners. In a way it is expected but cannot be considered,’’ said an IAS officer.
“It is nothing but sheer jealousy that is driving the rest of the officers to demand equal pay with them. When you are running a race, only the best will win. And it is natural that those who come first will be rewarded more. Where is injustice in that?’’ asked a joint secretary-level officer who had cleared the IAS examination with “flying colours”.
Another IAS officer said there is no comparison between the kind of job that we do and that of the rest of the services. “To a certain extent, IPS officers do an equally tough job. But still there is no comparison between the tasks of an IAS officer and the rest of the services,’’ he said.
In fact, it is not the first time that the issue of pay parity has cropped up before a Pay Commission.
“This issue of pay parity has been raised before every Pay Commission. But so far, it has been denied on the ground that the role of the IAS is still very important in the overall scheme of governance,’’ said a DoPT official.
The 6th Pay Commission had noted that the IAS has an important coordinating, multi-functional and integrating role in the administrative framework with wide experience of working across various levels in diverse areas in Government. “They hold important field-level posts at the district level and at the cutting-edge at the start of their careers with critical decision-making and crisis management responsibilities... The existing position would, therefore, need to be maintained. It will ensure that IAS officers near the beginning of their career are given slightly higher remuneration vis-à-vis other services and act as an incentive for the brightest candidates to enter this service,’’ it had said.
But the non-IAS officers term the decision of the Pay Commission “biased’’ as there has always been a member from the IAS community in the Commission. As in the case of the current Pay Commission, there is Vivek Rae, retired secretary-level IAS officer, along with former Supreme Court judge Justice Ashok Kumar Mathur, National Institute of Public Finance and Policy Director Rathin Roy and Meena Agarwal, OSD in Finance Ministry’s Expenditure Department.
Opposing this, a group of retired officials from the non-IAS services had moved the Delhi High Court challenging a notification on inclusion of the former IAS officer as a member of the panel.
The high court has issued notice to the Central Government on the plea filed by retired members of the All India Services, Central Civil Services and armed forces. “Past report of the commission gives rise to a reasonable apprehension that the reason for the repeated rejection of the demands for parity of other services in the AIS with the IAS is attributable to the fact that the commission has always comprised a member of the IAS,” the petition had argued.