M A I N   N E W S

Punjab to foot education bill of IAS officers’ kids
Ruchika M. Khanna/TNS

Reimbursement fineprint This scheme, approved by the Sixth Pay Commission for Central Government employees in 2008, will benefit 221 IAS officers in Punjab Expenditure incurred by officers towards education of a maximum of two children from Nursery to Class XII will be reimbursed by the government w.e.f September 2008 Reimbursement can be claimed among others for tuition fee, admission fee, lab fee, purchase of one set of books a year and boarding school fees Punjab Government employees have been waiting for their DA dues since January and the remaining 30% arrears of the Fifth Pay Commission amounting to `1,000 crore

Chandigarh, September 23
While Punjab has been delaying the payment of dearness allowance (DA) and arrears of the Fifth Pay Commission to three lakh employees citing a resource crunch, there is no apparent dearth of funds when it comes to pampering its bureaucrats.

The state government has sanctioned the Children Education Allowance Scheme for IAS officers with retrospective effect (September 2008 onwards). Under this scheme, the expenditure incurred by officers towards the education of their children from Nursery to Class XII will be reimbursed by the government.

This scheme, approved by the Sixth Pay Commission for Central Government employees in 2008, will benefit 221 IAS officers in the state. Under the scheme, reimbursement can be availed by a government servant for a maximum of two children. Reimbursement can be claimed for tuition fee, admission fee, laboratory fee, special fee charged for agriculture, electronics, music or any other subject; for practical work, library fee, games/sports and other extracurricular activities and purchase of one set of books in a year. The scheme also reimburses boarding school fees.

In case both spouses are eligible, one can claim the reimbursement. The reimbursement limit will be raised by 25 per cent every time the dearness allowance on the revised pay structure goes up by 50 per cent.

Some states have already implemented the scheme. In Kerala, the state government has fixed a ceiling of Rs 12,000 per child per year, whereas some states have fixed a ceiling of up to Rs 48,000 per child per annum in cases where children are studying in boarding schools. Sources in the Punjab Finance Department said the state government was yet to assess the exact outgo for implementing this scheme.

The state finance department made a case in this regard and sent it to Punjab Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal on April 8. He gave the nod to its implementation on September 19.

State government employees, who have been waiting for their DA dues since January and the remaining 30 per cent arrears of the Fifth Pay Commission (amounting to Rs 1,000 crore), are unhappy over implementation of the Children Education Allowance Scheme for IAS officers. They say the all-India service employees (all bureaucrats) had already got their DA in May, along with arrears on the DA, besides most other benefits announced by the pay panel.

Punjab Civil Secretariat Staff Association president Paramdeep Singh Pabhat said while state government employees had not got their DA till date, the Central Government had also announced the second instalment. “All employees posted in the Civil Secretariat and the Mini Secretariat will wear black badges tomorrow to protest against the delay in releasing DA,” he said.