Government services across Punjab were disrupted on Thursday as more than three lakh employees from nearly all departments, boards and corporations went on a day-long mass casual leave, demanding payment of long-pending dearness allowance arrears and other dues.
Joined by nearly four lakh pensioners, the employees staged sit-in protests at government offices at the district, tehsil and block levels. The impact of what unions have called a Maha Hartal was visible in government hospitals, dispensaries and educational institutions, though markets, private establishments, public and private transport, and emergency services remained operational.
Pending Dearness Allowance Dues
According to employee unions, Rs 20,161 crore in dearness allowance is pending. Of this, Rs 6,000 crore has been outstanding since 2021, while the remaining Rs 14,161 crore dates to before the Aam Aadmi Party government took office. Employees are currently receiving DA at 42 per cent of basic pay; they maintain it should be 58 per cent.
Government Response and Cabinet Sub-Committee
A day before the strike, Finance Minister Harpal Singh Cheema, who is heading a cabinet sub-committee set up to resolve employee issues, met with several employee unions in Chandigarh.
Addressing the unions, Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann said, “The Bhagwant Mann government is deeply sympathetic to your causes. Action on most of your major demands is already under process.” Cheema separately issued directives to the Transport, Education, Animal Husbandry and Finance departments, instructing them to “consider the legitimate demands of the employee unions with utmost sympathy” and to “expedite the necessary actions required for their swift resolution.”
Later in the day, Mann was scheduled to meet union leaders at the Punjab Armed Police complex in Jalandhar to seek a resolution.
Earlier Government Statement on Arrears
Earlier this month, Cheema said the government had inherited a Rs 14,191 crore liability in pay commission arrears. He said the state had already cleared more than Rs 6,000 crore under a High Court-approved liquidation plan and remained committed to paying all constitutionally and legally valid dues.
Cheema noted that the employee pay commission report was originally formulated in 2016 during the tenure of the Shiromani Akali Dal-BJP government but was not implemented for years. It was implemented only in July 2021, at which point dearness allowance arrears from January 1, 2016, to July 2021 were frozen, creating a liability of Rs 14,191 crore.
High Court Direction on Dues
Cheema’s statement followed an August 3 direction from the Punjab and Haryana High Court ordering the government to clear the pending DA arrears within 15 days. The court also restrained the state from undertaking large-scale advertising campaigns until the dues were paid.
“Till all such dues are cleared, the state of Punjab shall not resort to any unproductive expenditures such as large-scale advertising campaigns in print or social media as these expenses cannot justify the denial of dues admissible to state employees,” the High Court had observed.