Re-hired employees in Grade-17 and above: Outgoing PDM govt fails to implement pension reforms

ISLAMABAD: In the wake of severe pressure from top functionaries, the Pakistan Democratic Movement (PDM) government has backed out of the announced pension reforms under which re-hired employees of Grade-17 and above were asked to choose one package i.e. salary or pension.

An announcement was made to abolish drawing of both salary and pension simultaneously, keeping in view the severe financial constraints.

There are hundreds of re-hired employees and this practice continues unabated at the federal level, but this announcement cannot be implemented to-date though almost 40 days of the current fiscal year have passed.

Official sources said that proposals are under consideration for revision of the Management Payment (MP) scale for jacking up remuneration and pay structure because recently the outgoing government granted approval for the appointment of a retired official to the top position in one of the regulatory bodies.

“This official is behind making moves for convincing the Ministry of Finance for making revisions in the MP scales,” said the sources who added that Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif had returned the summary for revision in MP scale with certain observations. A question arises from this episode is as to why the government advertised the vacant posts when it had already decided who was going to fill the post?

Although, the government announced the much-trumpeted pension reforms on the occasion of approval of the last budget for 2023-24, so far the required changes in the rules of pension could not be made.

“The PDM government has left this decision to the caretaker government,” official sources confirmed to The News on Thursday.

In background discussion, one official said that the pension rules were changed during the tenure of military ruler Ziaul Haq under which the re-hired officers were allowed to draw both the salary and pension amounts. Then such provisions continued under these rules without any interruption for several years.