Demanding an increase in wages, allowances to the same level as officers who had moved from Reserve Bank of India during the formation days of NABARD, the All India NABARD Officers’ Association (AINBOA) has decided to sit on a ‘Dharna’ on Tuesday in protest against an anomaly allegedly created by government in September 2022.
“After observing a nation-wide full-day strike on December 16, 2022, AINBOA has decided to sit on dharna before Parliament on January 31 to protest against the anomalies in the wage revision created by an order issued by the Department of Financial Services (DFS),” the association said in a statement.
Pointing out that there was no difference in wages and allowances between officers who had moved from RBI and those directly recruited by NABARD until 2017, when the last settlement on wages made effective, AINBOA said that the government should withdraw the order issued by DFS on September 14, 2022.
The last officer, who had moved from RBI to join NABARD, retired in October 2022. However, as many as 104 officers who had retired between 2017 and 2022 would get the benefit of these higher pay in terms of arrear and also pension, sources said.
“The DFS order introduced dual and differentiated pay for the same cadre of officers – higher for those who had come from RBI and lower for those directly recruited by NABARD. One of the allowances reduced is Grade Allowance which is paid as per the grade of an officer,” said AINBOA. It also pointed out that officers in lower grades (in RBI) drew higher allowance than officers (of NABARD direct recruitment) in higher grade.
It also claimed that the allowances for the offices recruited by NABARD in the eighth settlement period (2017-22) are lower by 10-12 per cent from those who had come from RBI.