M A I N   N E W S

Centre clears new pension scheme
Tribune News Service

New Delhi, August 23
The Union Cabinet today gave clearance to a new contributory pension scheme for its employees who joined service after October, 2002, and the setting up of a national tax tribunal to speed up settlement of disputes.

At its meeting here, the Cabinet decided in favour of the new contributory pension scheme, which will be managed by independent fund managers. The proposal was mooted by the Finance Ministry for all government staff as part of efforts to reduce the government’s pension liabilities.

Sources said one-tenth of the basic pay and dearness allowance of the government employees would be deducted from their salary and put in the pension fund, while the Centre would make a matching contribution.

The government would mandate the proposed pension fund regulatory and development authority to license the new pension funds.

The new scheme follows the recommendations made by the B.K. Bhattacharya Committee that went into the Centre’s pension provisions.

The government also gave clearance to the setting up of a national tax tribunal, which will take up cases pending in high courts. This follows the announcement made by Finance Minister Jaswant Singh last month.

The move is being made in the wake of mounting outstanding tax arrears. Till May this year the figure stood at Rs 70,670 crore, while the number of pending cases in various courts have gone up to 3.15 lakh, locking up over Rs 42,860 crore in revenue.

The proposed national tax tribunal will take up all appeals against orders of income tax appellate tribunals lying with high courts.

The Union Cabinet also cleared a sugarcane package of Rs 678.06 crore for Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Punjab, Haryana and Uttaranchal.

This was to bridge the gap between state advisory prices and the Central Government-notified statutory minimum price (SMP) of sugarcane, official sources said.

CITU opposes pension scheme

New Delhi, August 23
The Centre of Indian Trade Unions today opposed the Cabinet decision on pension scheme, terming it as an “anti-employee” step. The trade union opposed the move on the grounds that it was practically a wage cut, apart from denial of pensionary benefits. “This attack on the pensionary benefits of the Central Government employees will be extended to the state government employees too,” a statement said.

The Confederation of Central Government Employees and Workers also condemned the government decision to introduce a contributory pension scheme. — TNS, PTI