90%-95% salaries, pensions being paid on time: AP govt

PNS|Vijayawada

The State government is passing the salary bills of employees and pensions in the first week of the month, said Finance department Special Chief Secretary Shamsher Singh Rawat.

In a press release here on Sunday, he said that on an average, more than 90% of the salary and pension bills will be passed by the Treasury by the last working day of the month and the same are released before the 5th of the following month depending on the RBI/Bank holidays, ways & means position of the State. He said that the majority of government employees are receiving their salaries and the government created a separate organisation ‘APCOS’ to take care of the interests of outsourced employees and the top priority is given to releasing salaries of outsourced employees.

Rawat said the State Finance department stated through a release by the Special Chief Secretary about the details of the employees’ welfare and wages issues. He said that in the years since its formation in 2014, the state finances have borne the severe impact of the unscientific bifurcation & the Covid-19 pandemic. Despite the tough challenges, this Government has taken a series of measures to ensure that salaries and pensions are paid on time. On an average, 90-95% of the salary and pensions will be passed by the Treasury by the last working day of the month and the same are released before 5th of the following month. Instructions were issued to all the DDOs to start processing the salary and pension bills from the 16th itself and complete by the 24th of the month and the Treasury to complete the Audit by month’s end so that salaries and pensions for the majority can be paid on the first working day of the following month.

The AP government explained that in addition to the regular employees and pensioners, this Government took special efforts to make payments on time to several scheme-based employees like Asha Workers, Anganwadis, Mid-day meal Cook cum Helpers, Home Guards, VOAs, RPs, Tribal Community Workers, professionals, contract employees, etc., and ensuring that everyone gets paid before 21 st of the month. Earlier salaries for some of these category employees used to get delayed for months together.

The AP Government created a separate organisation “APCOS” to take care of the interest of outsourced employees and the top priority given to releasing salaries of outsourced employees. The Government has already sanctioned 27% Interim Relief (IR) under which Government has paid Interim Relief, to the tune of Rs 11,984 crore for employees and Rs 5,933 crore for pensioners totalling to Rs 17,918 crore.