The new wage pact signed by the state run Coal India Ltd last week has seen an 88% increase in minimum basic of its employees to INR 15,712 per month, as against INR 8,360 during the previous deal.

The National Coal Wage Agreement IX covers the two public sector coal firms CIL and Singareni Collieries Company Ltd. The pact signed with trade Unions last week also saw a 25% rise in wages, which put an additional burden of INR 6,500 crore on the firm.

The hike, covering 363,000 non executive work force, would be effective retrospectively from July 1st2011 is for a five year period. A CIL statement said that “The minimum basic in NCWA IX now will be INR 15,712 per month, an increase of 88% from INR 8,360 of NCWA VIII. The other important highlights of the agreement are a special allowance of 4% of revised basic; HRA of 2% of the basic pay for those who have not been provided with residential accommodation in other than urban area; post retirement medicare scheme for retired non executives and their spouses to be finalized within 3 months.”

The agreement was inked in Delhi between central trade unions like the Congress backed Indian National Trade Union Congress Left backed CITU and AITUC, Hind Mazdoor Sabha, BJP backed Bharatiya Mazdoor Sangh and the Kolkata based firm’s management.

Mr R Mohandas director (personnel) of Coal India Ltd had said that “As per the NCWA VIII, which came into effect from July 1st 2006 workers got a raise of 24% in the wages, which had an impact of around INR 2,500 crore, so this was more than what they had expected.”

(Sourced from BS)