The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) on Sunday attacked the Congress, asking why it has not fulfilled its promise of restoring the old pension system in Himachal Pradesh and other states where it is in power.
Addressing a press conference at the BJP headquarters in New Delhi, party leader Ravi Shankar Prasad praised Prime Minister Narendra Modi for the decision to implement a unified pension scheme (UPS) for central government employees. Prasad criticised Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge for his jibe at the centre. PM Modi is “sensitive” to public issues and takes decisions in public interest after careful consideration, he added.
The Modi government does not take “ad hoc decisions”, the former Union minister said and asked Kharge to tell the nation why his party took a “U-turn” on its poll promise of implementing the erstwhile pension scheme in Himachal Pradesh, Karnataka and Telangana after coming to power in these states.
“The Congress has made the old pension system a major issue in Indian politics over the last two years. So much so that the Congress even made Priyanka Gandhi Vadra announce during the Himachal Pradesh elections that the party would implement the old pension system in the state if it comes to power,” Prasad said.
“Will this Congress just make announcements or will it also implement them? Congress in general and Rahul Gandhi in particular, please tell the nation whether they have implemented the old pension scheme as promised in Himachal Pradesh,” he said.
The BJP leader accused Gandhi of “cheating” people by making false promises of votes and asked him to desist from such practice.
Prasad said the Congress was “so tired of the palpable falsehood” of its assurance on the pension scheme that it could not muster the courage to include it in its Lok Sabha election manifesto.
Kharge, in a post on X, slammed the government and said, “The ‘U’ in UPS represents the U-turn of the Modi government. After June 4, the power of the people has prevailed over the arrogance of the Prime Minister’s power.”
However, the BJP claimed that the UPS has been in the making since 2023 and the media has also reported this.
“Mr Kharge, the Unified Pension Scheme has been in the works since 2023, much before June 4, 2024…” BJP IT chief Amit Malviya said in response to Kharge’s post.
“You are the president of Congress. You cannot appear so clueless and ill-informed. But what the new, well-thought-out pension plan has done is reduce Congress’s scope for wasteful politics,” he said.
Kharge’s attack came a day after the Union Cabinet approved an assured pension of 50 per cent of salary for those who joined service after January 1, 2004, under the National Pension System (NPS).
What is the new UPS?
The new pension scheme also guarantees a minimum assured pension of Rs 10,000 per month on retirement after a minimum of 10 years of service. This optional scheme will benefit 23 lakh central government employees, he said, adding that the number would be increased to 90 lakh if state governments want to join the scheme.
Announcing other features of UPS, Union Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw said that guaranteed family pension will be provided to the spouse of a deceased employee. Besides, there will be inflation indexation in guaranteed pension, guaranteed family pension and guaranteed minimum pension.
The sum of all these characteristics marks the transformation of the National Pension System (SNP), which promised pensions based on contributions from workers and the government.
The announcement came in a backdrop where several non-BJP states decided to revert to the erstwhile DA-linked pension scheme (OPS) and employee organisations in some other states raised demand for the same.
(With PTI inputs)
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