Staff Reporter : The Eighth Pay and Service Commission has submitted its report to the Finance Minister on Sunday, recommending Tk 80,000 as the highest basic salary and Tk 8,200 lowest for the civil servants. Presently, highest basic salary of a civil servant is Tk 40,000 and lowest is Tk4,100. The report proposed Tk 88,000 basic salary (special category) for senior secretaries existing Tk 42,000 and Tk 1 lakh for cabinet secretary and the principal secretary from Tk 45,000. The report proposed highest amount of raise for BCS cadres, raising their basic entry level salary at Tk 25,000 from the existing basic of Tk 11,000. Mohammed Farashuddin, Chairman of the 17-member commission, handed over the report to Finance Minister AMA Muhith at his office at 9:00am. After receiving the report, Minister Muhith said the new pay scale will come into effect from July 1 next year. “I am pleased to receive such a report. It will be implemented.” “We have proposed doubling the basic salary on the average for the 13 lakh civil servants employed in the country,” Farashuddin told reporters after submitting the report. Farashuddin, a former Bangladesh Bank (BB) governor, however, said that the employees in between the maximum and minimum salary structure will be varied in the proposed hike. When asked, he said, the government’s total expenditure, for salary of civil servants may increase 63 per cent once the proposed pay hike is implemented. “The main objective of the pay hike of the civil servants was to provide incentive and curb corruption,” he commented. The report proposed the basic pay (special category) for senior secretaries at Tk 88,000 from existing 42,000 and Tk 1 lakh for cabinet secretary and the principal secretary from Tk 45,000. The report proposed highest amount of raise for BCS cadres, raising their basic entry level salary at Tk 25,000 from the existing basic of Tk 11,000. The commission suggested many attractive incentives in the form of non-cash benefits like accommodation facility, mandatory insurance etc. Number of grades in the civil service has been lowered to 16 from the previous 20. The Commission also proposed setting up a bank naming “Sommriddhir Shopan” with Tk400 crore capital for the government employees and suggested selling 20 katha government land at Dainik Bangla investing the money to the bank. The commission also recommended lowering the forced retirement ceiling to 20 years instead of the prevailing 25-year service span. This means, if implemented, the government can retire a civil servant after 20 years of service. The 17-member Eighth Pay and Service Commission was formed in November last year. In August 2008, the then military-backed caretaker government had formed the 13-member Seventh Pay Commission headed by former secretary M Mustafizur Rahman. The Seventh Pay Commission took 14 months to submit its recommendations which the subsequent Awami League-led government implemented since July 2009.
