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Four years ago, the members of Parliament had given themselves a 300% hike in
salaries and managed to double their allowances. But that clearly wasn’t enough
for them.Now, a parliamentary panel looking into salaries and allowances has
put forward to the government a list of 27 perks — from cheap housing loan to
official vehicles to guest houses for lawmakers in all state capitals.The wish
list also includes a further enhancement in constituency allowance of MPs and
salary of their personal assistants.The panel further suggested that MPs should
be allowed to travel with “companions” and not just “spouses” in trains. At
present, MPs enjoy free first-class train travel anywhere in India with
spouse.The joint panel on salaries and allowances of MPs has so far held three
meetings since September on these issues but they are still waiting for the
Modi government’s response.The panel is headed by BJP MP Yogi
Adityanath.Lawmakers have also demanded security for chairpersons of
parliamentary panels when they move outside Delhi, MP’s quota in Kendriya
Vidyalaya to be at least 15 seats in a year, enhancing MPs local area
development (MPLAD) fund and giving diplomatic passport to former
MPs.Parliamentarians’ salaries and allowances are changed through amendment in
the Salary, Allowances and Pension of Members of Parliament Act.
In 2010, the amendment to the MPs’ salaries act hiked their monthly salary from
Rs. 15,000 to Rs. 50,000. Their constituency and daily allowances doubled from
Rs. 20,000 to Rs. 40,000 and Rs. 1,000 to Rs. 2,000 respectively.The panel,
however, now wants “study of salary, allowances, TA/DA etc. of MPs of foreign
countries for comparison with those existing for MPs in India.” It also sought
a permanent executive mechanism to give recommendations on salaries and perks
to the MPs from time to time.The NDA government is set to bring a bill to hike
the pension for MPs from the current Rs. 20,000 to Rs. 35,000 per month. The
bill also plans to enhance the rate of additional pension for each completed
year in excess of five years and include divorced or widowed daughters as
“dependents” of former MPs for family pension.
