THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: A move to subvert the participatory pension sanctioned by the government for the employees of the Regional Cancer Center (RCC) has been reported. Pensioners and employees are worried about Health Department Secretary Tinku Biswal's proposal to stop the share from employees to the scheme, without introducing an alternative mechanism. The Health Secretary is trying to end the scheme completely while the High Court is considering a petition filed by a section of employees against the participation pension.
It was in 2011 when VS Achuthanandan government sanctioned participation pension in RCC, that too only to employees who entered service till 31st May 2013. In 2013, the Oommen Chandy government approved the rule of the scheme and allocated Rs 34 crore as a corpus fund and started paying pension in 2015. Meanwhile, when the issue reached the court, the court directed not to collect the share from the complainants, but in 2020, the first Pinarayi government extended the participation pension to all the employees of the RCC. With this, those who joined the service later also came under the pension limit. However, a group of employees filed a complaint demanding a review of the plan. In the meeting held on 12th of this month considering that complaint, the secretary of the department gave instruction to stop taking employee share for participatory pension without suggesting any alternatives. If the share is not taken, the project will end with that.
Employees 10% Organization 5%
At present the share for the scheme is 10% of the salary and 5% from the institution. A group is demanding the National Pension Scheme (NPS) in which 10% is paid by the employees and 14% by the organization instead. RCC did try to implement NPS along with the pension scheme in 2016, but the finance department stopped it citing financial liability.
10% cancer patients
RCC
Total employees 857
Doctors 110
From other categories 747
Total pensioners 137
Doctors 17
Others 120