VIJAYAWADA: Payment of wages to the state government employees and pensioners is getting delayed allegedly due to paucity of funds. It is learnt that though a majority of the regular employees received their salaries by Tuesday, bills of contract and outsourcing staff are still waiting for clearance.
According to sources, the process of payment of wages to regular employees continued on Tuesday (April 6) and is expected to go on for a few more days. “Gone are the days of receiving salaries on the first day of the month. It is unfair to even expect that. For the past 7 months, the government has been initiating the process of payment of wages, which lingers for some days. The government has been crediting the wages and pensions as per the availability of funds,’’ said a leader of an employees’ union.
Stating that funds to the tune of Rs 6,000 crore are required for payment of pensions and salaries of regular, contract, outsourcing staff and those working at village/ward secretariats and with the APSRTC, the union leader said the government is finding it difficult to make the needed funds available in view of the increase in expenditure.
“Apart from rolling out various welfare schemes, the government recruited more than one lakh employees in village/ward secretariats, and is giving Rs 5,000 as monthly honorarium to about 2.66 lakh volunteers.
“This has resulted in a huge financial burden, and the same is expected to grow once the pay scale of the village/ward secretariat employees is fixed in the months to come,” the union leader noted.
He further said the payments with regard to surrendered leaves, earned leaves, leave encashment, retirement benefits are not being made since October 2020 because of the precarious finances.However, officials say that the beginning of the new financial year, a series of holidays and some technical issues caused the delay in the payment of wages and pensions.