Nirmala Sitharaman: The demand to restore the old pension scheme is gaining momentum day by day. Rajasthan, Chhattisgarh and Punjab governments have announced to restore the old pension scheme. Apart from this, in the Gujarat elections, Arvind Kejriwal has promised to restore the old pension if he comes to power. In this connection, labor organizations on Monday demanded Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman to restore the old pension system (OPS) as well as prepare a reliable social security structure for the unorganized sector workers.

In an e-mail,

the joint platform of ten labor organizations kept their demands regarding the budget, in an e-mail sent to the Ministry of Finance, kept their demands regarding the next budget. However, these organizations did not attend the online meeting called for pre-budget discussions. During the tenure of the Atal Bihari Vajpayee government, the National Pension System (NPS) was implemented from January 2004 by abolishing the OPS. NPS is a contribution based pension scheme and there is no provision for dearness allowance.

Demand for face-to-face meeting

After increasing complaints of employees getting less amount of pension under NPS, the labor organizations have intensified the demand for re-implementation of OPS itself. The forum of labor organizations said, 'The government should re-implement the old pension system instead of NPS by giving contribution on its behalf.' These organizations did not participate in the online meeting, demanding a face-to-face meeting with the Finance Minister. Each organization was given three minutes to present their demands related to their area.

Trade Union Coordination Center (TUCC) general secretary SP Tiwari, who attended the pre-budget consultation meeting, also said that in the meeting, there was a demand for restoration of OPS instead of NPS. Along with this, a demand was also made to increase the amount of minimum pension from Rs 1,000 to Rs 5,000.

Bhartiya Mazdoor Sangh (BMS) said that apart from increasing the amount of minimum pension, it should also be linked with dearness allowance so that the needs of the pensioners can be met. BMS also demanded the government to allocate more funds to the unorganized sectors. Apart from this, there has also been a demand to increase the monthly honorarium to the workers associated with Anganwadi, Asha and mid-day meal schemes.