Kingfisher to start clearing pending salary

Beleagured Kingfisher Airlines chairman and managing director Vijay Mallya on Monday assured the employees that their salary for a couple of months will be disbursed from this week after tax authorities defreezed the airline’s bank accounts.

 Kingfisher’s bank accounts were frozen by the tax authorities in February, which restricted the carrier’s ability to make salary and other payments to ensure smooth running of its daily operations, resulting in the grounding of several flights.

 The bank accounts were unfrozen yesterday after the airline paid a total of Rs 64 crore to various tax authorities before March 31,  Mallya said in a letter to employees.

 Effectively, the airline’s junior staff will be paid on April 4, while all pilots and engineers will be paid on April 9 and 10, he told employees.

 “My only focus now is to start paying your seriously overdue salaries,” he added.

 Mallya is under pressure from his airline’s lenders to inject equity into Kingfisher Airlines, which has slashed its flight schedule and grounded most of its fleet.

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22,000 candidates to appear in JKCET

As many as 22,000 candidates are appearing in Jammu and Kashmir Common Entrance Test (JKCET-2011) scheduled to be held from Saturday for which the Board of Professional Entrance Examination (BOPEE) has set up 35 centres across the state.

 The test would be held for 2-days in four phases with two papers in one day for selecting candidates for MBBS, BE, BDS, BVSC and other allied professional courses run by the government and private institutes in the state.

 Officials said that about 12,000 candidates from Kashmir division and 10000 from Jammu are expected to appear in the test. About 19 centers have been established in Jammu, while 16 have been set up in Kashmir.

 On June 25, candidates will appear for Chemistry and Physics papers while on June 26, test would be held for Biology and Mathematics. 

 Sources said that Crime Branch and General Administration Department (GAD) have deputed special observers to keep impersonators at bay.

 Giving details about the arrangements made for keeping a check on any type of unfair means, the Controller examination, Gopal Gupta said that fool proof measures have been put in place. “So far everything is running smoothly”, Gupta said.

 He said that as an added security measure, the BOPEE, for the past few years, had made it mandatory that each candidate who appears in the test has his photograph attached with the answer sheet. “We are in constant touch with the police department and have sought their help to keep a watch on the undesirable elements”, he said.

 Pertinently, during last years a few impersonation cases were detected in the entrance test conducted by Batra Medical College, which holds separate test for the MBBS course run by the trust. Officials said that to help students to know about their performance, they would be provided with the carbon copies of the answer sheets after the completion of the test. “Answer key will be uploaded on the website on June 26,” officials added.

Govt to recruit 50,000

In a bid to overcome shortage of staff in the departments manning emergency services in the State, the Government planned to recruit over 50,000 casual staff. The Government is working out a roadmap for the recruitment and the process would start as soon as the selection process was approved.

The Government Departments, which have been identified so far for engagement of casual staff, included Power, Public Health Engineering (PHE), Irrigation and Flood Control, Health and Medical Education, Education, Rural and Urban Development.

Some other Departments could also be incorporated in the list at the later stage, official sources said.

The Government is earmarking the Department wise posts.

Sources said the Government has taken a decision in principle to appoint over 50,000 casual staff in the Department, rendering emergency services to the people following reports by the authorities at the helm of affairs that they were facing acute shortage of staff in manning the services.

After a long drawn exercise, the Government has decided to overcome shortage of staff to provide emergency services to the people uninterruptedly by recruiting 50,000 casual staff.

Initially, it had been decided that Heads of the Departments in consultations with the Ministers would appoint the casual staff. However, the Opposition MLAs resented the proposal on the ground that it would lead to "pick and choose’’ policy by the Government.

The Government was now working on a new proposal for recruitment of casual staff. A Ministerial panel was holding consultations with the officials to work out a system to recruit casual staff without involving Services Selection Recruitment Board (SSRB) or any other recruitment agency.

Authorities were of the view that process to recruit casual staff can’t be handed over to a recruitment agency. More over, the agency could take a lot of time to recruit the staff while the Government wants immediate deployment of the staff to run the emergency services, sources said.

The emergency staff is proposed to be recruited on Rs 125 per day basis, a rate being paid to daily rated workers in different departments of the Government. The Government from Rs 110 recently revised the rates of daily rated workers per day to Rs 125 per day.

The Government was yet to take a decision on whether the casual labourers would be absorbed permanently in the jobs after seven years or not.

"An exercise is underway to work out all modalities of recruitment of casual staff. As soon as the modalities are finalized, the Government would start the recruitment process’’, sources said, adding the authorities were confident that the emergency services would start running smoothly to quite an extent with the recruitment of over 50,000 casual staff.

Employees to get Insurance Cover

Govt enters into agreement with Oriental company 4.5 lakh employees to get accidental insurance cover

In an important decision that would benefit over 4.5 lakh employees of the State Government, Public Sector Undertakings (PSUs), autonomous bodies including Local Bodies and Universities and all daily rated workers engaged before January 31, 1994, the Government today entered into a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with Oriental Insurance Company Limited for accidental death and disability insurance cover for the employees.

The MoU under ‘Group Janta Personal Accidental Insurance Policy’ for a period of three years was signed between the State Government and Oriental Insurance Company Limited few days back and would come into force from June 14, 2011. The MoU would be renewed at the end of each year.

Official sources said the agreement involved annual premium of Rs 90 only plus States taxes at the rate of Rs 9 per employee.

"The policy is compulsory for all categories of employees mentioned in the MoU and will secure them against accidental death and disabilities, partial or full’’, sources said.

In addition to about 4 lakh State Government and 30,000 PSU employees, the staff of autonomous bodies including Local Bodies and Universities and all daily rated workers, engaged by the Government Departments, PSUs and autonomous bodies on or before January 31, 1994 but who continued to work till date will be benefited out of the new scheme.

The employees would be covered for Rs 2.5 lakh in case of an accident. For disabilities, the insurance cover would vary as per percentage of the disability, sources said. The insurance company would pay the amount to nominees of the employee in case of their accidental death and to the employee himself/herself in case of disabilities.

Deduction of Rs 99 on account of insurance premium would be made by the Drawing and Disbursement Officers (DDOs) from the salaries of employees payable for the month of June 2011 and remitted to the Government treasury.

The Government has asked the DDOs of the Government Departments to furnish details of their employees in respect of whom the premium amount would be deducted and remitted to the Government account.

"It would be personal liability of DDOs/Managing Directors/CEOs/HoDs of concernedDepartment/Organisations to register every employee under this scheme with the Nodal Officer, Finance Department so that no employee is left out.

The Nodal Officer shall not be accepting any intimation of an accidental death or disability of any employee for processing insurance payments under the scheme unless full particulars are not made available in advance to him on or before 31st July, 2011.

"To ensure speedy settlement of insurance claims, intimations of accidental death or partial/permanent disabilities should be promptly sent to the Nodal Officer in the Finance Department directly by the concerned DD not later than 45 days from the date of accident’’, sources said.

They added that in the event of accidental death or permanent total disablement of an employee, as defined in the policy, M/s Oriental Insurance Company will, in addition to insurance cover as per the scheme, also be bearing one time education grant for the dependant children of the insured employee.

One dependent child below age of 25 years would get 10 per cent of capital sum insured subject to maximum of Rs 10,000 while more than one dependant child below age of 25 years would get 10 per cent of capital sum insured subject to maximum of Rs 20,000.

In the event of accidental death of an insured employee, Oriental Insurance Company would also be reimbursing the expenses incurred on transportation of the dead body of the deceased from the place of accident to his/her residence on actual basis or 2 per cent of the Capital Sum Insured (Rs 2.5 lakh), whichever is less.

Newly appointed migrant employees without salaries

Kashmiri Pandit Sabha (KPS) Ambphalla in a meeting here today held under the chairmanship of its president Prof A N Sadhu discussed various issues pertaining to displaced Pandits.

The meeting expressed concern over non payment of wages to the newly appointed KP employees in Valley for last six months. Terming it a serious lapse it urged the Government to take immediate steps in releasing the salaries of these employees so that their financial conditions do not deteriorate further.

The meeting also took serious note of the recent reports regarding change of names of some historical places and hillocks in the Valley. It said since these places have historical background apart from the sentimental attachments of the community, any such contemplation will have unpleasant impact on the restoration and consolidation of composite culture which is sought to be revived and strengthened by all the rational thinking people.

The meeting in an appeal to the Government urged it to take remedial measures of keeping the historical and heritage terminology intact. The Sabha however will appreciate any initiative aimed at restoring peace and normalcy in Valley.