Kolkata, Feb 11: Union Minister of Environment, Forest and Climate Change, Bhupendra Yadav, on Wednesday said Mamata Banerjee is the only Indian Chief Minister who moved the Supreme Court against her state government employees to avoid paying dearness allowance at par with the central government employees and arrears accrued on it over years.
“Mamata Banerjee is the only Indian Chief Minister who has approached the Apex Court against her own government employees. She had alleged that so many people were killed because of the special intensive revision exercise. But in reality, no one was killed because of that revision exercise. On the contrary, several state government employees died out of frustration after being denied their legitimate dearness allowance dues,” Yadav said while interacting with the media persons here on Wednesday afternoon.
Also present at the press conference was the leader of the opposition in the West Bengal Assembly, Suvendu Adhikari. He ridiculed the Chief Minister for avoiding media queries on the Supreme Court order on dearness allowance arrears to West Bengal government employees, claiming that the matter was sub-judice.
“I want to remind the Chief Minister that the matter is no longer sub-judice since the Supreme Court had already given a clear order in the matter last week. The Supreme Court had given clear instructions to the West Bengal government on the payment of dearness allowance arrears to the state government since that payment was part of their legitimate right. The Chief Minister had violated the Supreme Court order again and again. If this time, she does that again, there are legal provisions against it,” the leader of the opposition in the state Assembly said.
The Supreme Court’s verdict on February 5 directed the West Bengal government to pay dearness allowance arrears to the state government employees and pensioners for the period between 2008 and 2019, and also 25 per cent of that amount by March 31 this year. The payments are expected to cost the state exchequer a little over Rs 10,000 crore immediately and Rs 42,000 crore in the long run.
IANS
