DESPITE contributing towards Employees Pension Scheme 1995 during whole service time for 30/35 years, 71 lakh retired employees are being paid bare minimum pension of Rs 1,000 per month. The amount being too meager to spend dignified life in their last days, pensioners staged sit-in dharna at Jantar Mantar many times including in front of EPFO office, New Delhi. But, this long pending just demand of the retired employees still remains ignored making their life tensed with the each passing day. In a meeting of the National Agitation Committee (NAC) Chhattisgarh Unit held at Smriti Nagar, Bhilai on Sunday, State President of NAC L M Siddiqui said that Central leaders of NAC Commander Raut and Virendra Singh also met the Prime Minister Modi twice along MP Hema Malini on April 3, 2020 and August 5, 2021 requesting to enhance the minimum pension from existing Rs 1,000 to Rs 7,500 per month linking it with DA.

 

The Prime Minister was also urged for implementation of the Supreme Court judgment of October 4, 2016 in letter and spirit. However, all the requests of NAC leaders have been turned deaf ear, he added. Siddiqui said that with no immediate solution to the issue, NAC has decided further course of action in future. As planned, meetings and conventions are being organised at State-level all over India. Such conventions are already been held in Kolkata, Jamshedpur, Prayag Raj, Ajamgarh, Thrissur, Hyderabad and other cities. In Chhattisgarh, the convention is proposed at Bhilai on March 27, 2022. This decision was taken during the office-bearers’ meeting of NAC CG state on Sunday, Siddiqui added. Ex-officers Association (Bhilai Steel Plant S R Das, GS ex-OA (BSP) Dilip Verma, Vice-President, ex-OA (BSP) R Gupta, President FCI REW Association U Varadarajan, President Van Vikas Nigam REW Association Narayan Bhawsar, President NAC (Durg District) Umesh Upadhyaya, GS NAC (Durg) K S Thakur, GS (NAC, Raipur) G P Singh along with other seniors were present in the meeting.