By Our Reporter
SHILLONG, Nov 13: The Garo Hills Autonomous District Council (GHADC) is planning to go beyond temporary relief provided by the state government on the salary issue and introduce administrative reforms to prevent the problem from recurring.
“Now the functioning will smoothen and the problem is only with the salary component. We could not function as mandated, and now, since the salary problem is more or less being solved, we can function smoothly,” said GHADC Deputy Chief Executive Member (CEM), Nikman Marak, on Thursday.
The state government has released 13 months’ pending salaries of GHADC employees, amounting to over Rs 80 crore.
“To prevent such a salary situation from recurring, we are in the process of reforming the council,” the Deputy CEM said.
“We are going through a reformation process, and by this session we are bringing rules and Acts to bring administrative reforms in respect of employees and others,” he added.
The Meghalaya government had, in October, released Rs 79.5 crore to the Garo Hills Autonomous District Council to clear pending salaries.
Of this, Rs 11 crore is towards dues payable to the GHADC, while Rs 68.5 crore is an advance payment against future royalties.
Earlier, Chief Minister Conrad K. Sangma had informed that the money has been released to an escrow account meant specifically for salary disbursement. This account will be monitored to ensure the funds are used only for salary purposes.
With this amount, the district council will now be in a position to release 12 months of salary backlogs for its employees.
