PESHAWAR: All Government Employees Grand Alliance has announced march on Islamabad and a protest sit-in outside Parliament House on Oct 6 to press the government for increasing their salaries in line with the prevailing inflation.

According to a statement issued here, a meeting of employees of different departments was held in Peshawar with PWD Labour Union president Malik Nisar Khan to finalise preparations for the sit-in. The participants asked the employees to ensure their participation in the protest.

He said the alliance had been established as a result of the government’s failure to increase the employees’ salaries in the budget 2020-21. He said the alliance leaders had held meetings in different districts to mobilise its members before marching towards Islamabad.

Other labour leaders, including Momin Khan, Abdul Salam, Habibullah Umerzai, Farhatullah, Ijaz Ahmad, Abdur Rahman and Iqbal Khalil, also shared views about the problems being faced by the employees due to price hike. The leaders of the employees demanded revision of pay scales as per recommendations of the pay and pension committee, merger of all ad hoc reliefs into the basic pay and pay raise commensurate to the prevailing price hike.

They also sought increase in the house rent and medical allowance and issuance of health cards to all the public sector employees. They said that employees of all government departments were prepared to participate in the proposed sit-in in order to take a unified stand for seeking solution to their demands.

“We are not against the government, but it is our basic constitutional right to raise voice for our rights,” they said and added that other provinces had increased salaries and allowances, but in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa the workers could not get any financial relief.

They said that in addition to the increasing power tariff, the price of wheat flour, sugar, cooking oil, etc were frequently increased without any official check.

Published in Dawn, October 5th, 2020