‘Risk & Hardship Allowance’ under consideration in Finance Ministry: PMO to railway S&T union
New Delhi: The proposal to grant ‘Risk and Hardship Allowance’ to Signal and Telecom staff in the Indian Railways is still under consideration with the Ministry of Finance, a response from the Prime Minister’s Office to the S&T workers union said.
The Indian Railway S&T Maintainers’ Union had written to the PMO on September 12, requesting it to ask the Ministry of Finance to approve a long-pending proposal for ‘risk and hardship allowance’ for workers in the S&T department.
“It may be appreciated that the proposal regarding the grant of Risk and Hardship Allowance to fresh categories is still under consideration of the Ministry of Finance,” the PMO said on Tuesday. It added, “The matter is being pursued at the highest level in the Ministry of Finance through meetings between higher-level officers. Earnest efforts are being taken by this Ministry (Railway Ministry) to solicit an early approval from the Ministry of Finance.” Dissatisfied with the PMO’s response, the office bearers of IRSTMU have demanded a definite time frame to approve and implement the ‘Risk and Hardship Allowance’ to S&T workers as early as possible as, according to them, the matter has been under consideration first with the Railway Ministry and now with the Finance Ministry since February 2019. “It has become an unending wait for S&T workers for a valid demand. Our workers sacrifice their lives to ensure safe train operations as every year many S&T maintainers are run over by speeding trains. But the government is moving at a snail’s pace to approve a very legitimate and valid demand,” Alok Chandra Prakash, general secretary, of the Indian Railway S&T Maintainers’ Union (IRSTMU), said.
According to Prakash, the Union for the first time raised the demand for ‘Risk and Hardship Allowance’ in 2016 when one of its workers was murdered at Kota in Rajasthan when he, to maintain safe train operation, refused to open the level crossing gate for the traffic. Then, on February 9, 2019, the Union observed a ‘Black Day’ in support of ‘Risk and Hardship Allowance’ when one of its workers was run over by a train and the railway administration, even after being informed by the loco pilot about the incident, allegedly left the dead body on the track to be hit and mutilated by other passing trains for several hours at night.
