Ferozepur, August 25, 2016 : In view of high inflation in the market, living has become very hard especially for the non-pensioners.
There is no security of a employee who retires without pension. The Punjab Government employees are fighting against the decision of the Punjab Government to withdraw the pension scheme. Similar is the position of employees retire in private sector.
Speaking to the media persons, non-pensioners Nand Lal Bajaj, Ashok Kataria, Sarwan Handa, D.K.Sahi, R.P.Makol – retired as Senior Branch Officer from The Punjab State Cooperative Marketing Federation Ltd. Chandigarh – said, “Living on a low income in later life is very hard work. There is no room for luxuries. Every penny has to be spent very carefully. Shopping lists have to be made very carefully.
He further said, “When I retired in 2008, I was enjoying a handsome bank interest up to 14 per cent, which now stands reduced to 7.5 per cent meaning thereby the total interest income has gone almost half.
The family pension amount out of the Provident Fund is very nominal of Rs.1600 only, he added.
While the pension of the government employees go on increase with the increase of Dearness Allowance (DA) and some of them are getting much more than their salary even besides other medical reimbursement benefits. At the same time, the interest on the deposits received at the time of retirement and other savings has drastically gone down making it hard to survive when the prices of daily useable products have gone too high.
Nand Lal Bajaj said, the pension to each retire irrespective of government or private sector is must for survival. The government must think seriously over this issue and ensure that pension provision is kept right from the joining of any employee in service by making deductions from the salary for raising the corpus fund which could later on be converted into pension trust in both government and private sectors.
Stating about his deteriorating health day by day, he said, in the old age, the requirement of medical help is increased and in view of costly treatments, the survival without availability of sufficient funds or fully cashless health insurance schemes is the need of the hour.
Knowing that the Supreme Court has taken a decision to revise the family pension of minimum to Rs.15,000, I feel, it will be great relief to the non-pensioners, he added.