NMC urges PM, others to reconsider decision of freezing DA release

Excelsior Correspondent
JAMMU, Dec 5: National Mazdoor Conference (NMC) has urged upon the Prime Minister, Union Finance Minister and Union MoS Finance to reconsider the decision of freezing Dearness Allowance (DA) release of employees and pensioners of Centre, States and UTs till June 2021.
A handout stated that memorandums with such demands were also sent to these ministers.
Addressing a meeting of NMC activists here today its president, Subash Shastri said installments of the DA are additional supporting financial assistance to cope up the burden of rising prices of essential commodities.
He claimed that DA is not wage increase but compensation against erosion of real wages and the cost of living.
Shastri also talked about the services rendered by the salaried class of the country in battle against COVID-19 and said that freezing DA will severely impact the life of this class and pensioners.
He demanded an early release of two installments of 4 and 5 per cent DA due from January last and July 1, 2020 to all the employees and pensioners of the country so that they may heave a sigh of relief from the price index.
The NMC leader also demanded disbursement of long pending wages of daily rated workers and a separate wage head for regularly disbursement of their monthly salaries till their regularization.
Hike in wages of daily rated workers to Rs. 600 per day besides their regularization, setting up of Labour Welfare Board, implementation of all central laws in J&K UT were among other demands raised on the occasion.
Shastri also demanded hike in medical allowance of J&K pensioners to Rs. 1000 per month at par with their counterparts of Central government.
Rajan Babu Khajuria, B.S Jamwal, Surinder Kumar, Ram Singh, Darshan Bawa, Ramesh Sharma, Tarseem Sharma, J.P Sharma, Gara Ram, Mohd Sadeeq and Sarpanch Sukhdev Singh were also present in the meeting.