AFTER NO LOCKDOWN PAY FOR 250 BLIND WORKERSBMC ‘denied full salaries’ to its disabled and older employees as wellCivic body’s affidavit in High Court says paying full salaries to these employees will adversely affect its finances
Mumbai Mirror 27-09-2020 sunil.bag...@timesgroup.com TWEETS @baghelsMIRROR The BMC denied full salaries for the strictest lockdown phase to not just its visually-impaired employees, but also to the physically disabled and those above 55 years of age, who were exempted from attendance on health grounds, an affidavit filed by the civic body before the Bombay High Court indicates. Vishwanath Jadhav, joint chief personnel officer of the establishment section of the BMC’s General Administration Department, filed this affidavit last week while opposing a public interest litigation (PIL) of the well-known NGO National Association of Blind (NAB). The PIL seeks payment of full salaries to 278 visually impaired BMC employees for the period when the lockdown was implemented in its strictest form – March 23 to June 30. The affidavit, defending BMC’s decision to not pay full salaries to the visually impaired employees, refers to the money “the BMC may have to pay” to the physically disabled as well. It says, “If these categories of employees are granted special leave without loss of pay, the respondent corporation will be required to pay approximately Rs12.22 crore (Rs 2.75 crore for visually impaired employees and Rs 9.47crore for other disabled employees).” The next sentence specifies another category of employees which may seek parity from the BMC if the court were to ask it to pay salaries for the same period to the disabled employees. The affidavit says, “Similarly, the corporation has granted relaxation in attending duties to approximately 283 employees beyond 55 years of age having health issues such as diabetes, high blood pressure and dialysis (for kidney ailments). Similar demand will be raised by these categories of employees, even though they are not eligible, and if they are to be treated according to the same principle, then the corporation will have to pay approximately Rs 422.59 crore, which will adversely affect its financial condition.” Advocate Uday Warunjikar, appearing for the NAB, submitted before the court that BMC had nullified its liability to the visually impaired employees with retrospective effect, as its directive issued in March, only exempted these employees from attending offices. However, a directive issued on May 26 said that the relevant period will be treated as “permissible leave.” He said that while he had details of only one employee at the time of filing the PIL, the NAB had managed to get details of more than 25 employees to show that it wasn’t just the salary for the relevant period, which was affected, but the situation continues as the BMC was recovering “arrears” of salary deductions from them, forcing them to work on zero or extremely low pay. The PIL cites the directives of the state government as well as the Centre since March to show that they had exempted disabled employees from attendance and one such directive said that they be treated on “leave without loss of pay.” Senior Advocate BV Bukhari, appearing for the BMC, submitted that the BMC was not bound by the resolutions or notifications of the state or the Central government, as it was a local self-government body. He said that the BMC was not only following the Rights of Persons with Disabilities Act, but, in fact, was doing more than what other governments were doing. The court, however, questioned the BMC’s assertion that it was not bound to follow the notifications of the state or the Central government, saying it was doing so in certain other aspects related to the pandemic. The court has reserved its judgment on the petition. -- Disclaimer: 1. Contents of the mails, factual, or otherwise, reflect the thinking of the person sending the mail and AI in no way relates itself to its veracity; 2. AI cannot be held liable for any commission/omission based on the mails sent through this mailing list.. Search for old postings at: http://www.mail-archive.com/accessindia@accessindia.org.in/ --- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "AccessIndia" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to accessindia+unsubscr...@accessindia.org.in. To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/a/accessindia.org.in/d/msgid/accessindia/CADetga-J-A567UWi%2Bh5iw14SNAXMobHdKgr6-NUDFaLbZcwk9Q%40mail.gmail.com.