National Federation
of
Akashvani and Doordarshan Employees (NFADE)
Room
no. 333, Akashvani Bhawan,
New Delhi-110001
NFADE/
Repeal/ Cir/2011/01 06/06/11
Need for Political Consensus on
Repealing Prasar Bharati
Dear Comrades and Colleagues
These days, the political establishment is going
through tumultuous times on account of a host of developments in the recent
past. Difficulties in AIR and Doordarshan might
appear too small in front of some other issues prevailing in the political
horizon. But, that should certainly not be reason for us to be complacent and
allow further deterioration of these departments.
The movement of NFADE has been able to convince the
government about the dark future of employees in Prasar
Bharati and compelled the Govt
of India to bring in normalcy to some extent. Restoration of the facilities of
Central Govt employees to the employees of AIR and DD
has been a major achievement for us. ,
As all these facilities were in the form of temporary
solutions, we have been continuing our efforts till today for a final
settlement. Our experience with Prasar Bharati so far has made us realize that owing to a number
of shortcomings in the implementation of the act, Prasar
Bharati cannot protect the interest of its employees.
Subsequently, we were forced to take the line that “Since we have joined as Central Govt
employees it should be ensured that we should retire as Central Govt employees”. While hoping to see some positive inputs in the smooth
functioning of AIR and DD, we used different slogans such as repeal PB Act 1990, follow the models of Supreme Court, Election
Commission, UPSC, SSC etc or even Railway Model. When there were objections in
comparing it with these models, we even hoped to see some life in a new model
by retaining the employees & assets with Govt of
India while granting autonomy in policy decisions to PB Board.
Meanwhile Govt has introduced the PB amendment Bill 2010 in the Rajya Sabha on 31st
August 2010 proposing to retain the employees joined upto
05/10/2007 on deemed deputation with all facilities at par with Central Govt employees while handing over the rest to PB. This has
been done on the recommendations of GoM. This will
not only create different sets of employees in AIR and DD, but might result in
conflicting circumstances in coming years. A number of other sub sections of
the bill are also not in the interest of the employees. Now, the Govt has forwarded some newer recommendation to the GoM, which includes making it easier to remove the CEO, and
full time members of PB; Removal both the DGs (ex officio) and the two
employee’s representatives from the PB Board: reducing the tenure of full time
members to 3 years instead of 6 years etc.
We are certainly not
bothered about the removal of employees’ representatives from the board, but
what bothers us is the future of the recruitments taking place in coming years
and how adversely it is going to impact us all. It is learnt that the GoM has decided in principle to strengthen the working of Prasar Bharati by providing
financial support so as to brighten the possibility of passing the PB Amendment
Bill during the Monsoon session of Parliament. Though it may look like a good
proposal in some aspects, its disadvantages include:
….2/….
National Federation
of
Akashvani and Doordarshan Employees (NFADE)
Room
no. 333, Akashvani Bhawan,
New Delhi-110001
- 2 -
1.
The government can in future take a general decision to
restrict the facilities of Central Government Employees to only those working
in government departments. In that case all those working in Prasar Bharati will become
non-eligible for these facilities. Example: Section-22 of Prasar
Bharati Act provides exemption to PB from taxes (at
par with other government departments). But during the budget speech in 2004
this exemption was restricted only to government departments. Thereafter, Prasar Bharati has become liable
to pay taxes to the government (e.g. sales tax, income tax, property tax etc).
2.
When the department starts recruiting employees other than ‘govt employees’, then all of us are bound to be treated as
a burden, and efforts will surely be made to phase us out as soon as possible.
3.
There is a possibility that, in due course, it might be difficult
for Prasar Bharati to
arrange enough funds for the salary of the employees. In that case, Prasar Bharati may start relying
only on contractual employees as recommended by a Task force some time back.
4.
With the availability of enough ‘non-govt
employees’, the day is not far when we start loosing
our bargaining power.
We must not forget that
whatever we achieved till today is only due to the unity of the members, irrespective
of their cadre and discipline, of constituent Associations of NFADE. Midway we
must realize that we have miles to go to reach the destination i.e. repealing
the Prasar Bharati Act. It
is also a fact that at the time of constituting the Federation, it was accepted
very clearly that the NFADE will fight for the issues which are common to all
employees (particularly for all members of the constituent Associations) but
the individual Associations or joint movements of similarly placed Associations
will fights for the issues concerned with their members. Accordingly individual
Associations and combined bodies used to make their movements, without
affecting the united movement of NFADE.
After a series of agitational steps like; Gate meetings, Dharna,
Parliament March, Rabjbhavan March, Boycott of duties
etc. we have proved the point that united Federation has immense strength. It
is now time for us to utilize our total energy for a mass campaign to convince
the policy makers of the country about the need of the hour i.e. ‘retaining the
National Public Service Broadcaster, the AIR&DD, with Govt
of India’.
The fallout of Commonwealth scam and the
failure of the management & Prasar Bharati Board from time to time for the last 14 years on
one hand and the boost in the private media in this time period proved that the
concept of PB is irrelevant today.
When we approach the leaders of political
parties in opposition, we can also point out the latest developments in which
the PB Board was compelled by the Govt to change its
decision and Minutes on the appointments of DGs of AIR & DD. The PB Board,
which is making all out efforts to transfer the employees to its fold and
claiming to have autonomy has even changed its minutes and decisions under the
pressure of the Ministry and proved beyond doubt that they don’t even have the
freedom to forward its decision, which is envisaged in the Prasar
Bharati Act 1990. It is also learnt that Ministry has taken a
very dangerous decision of Public Private Participation in Doordarshan
DTH Services, future Cricket coverage of All India Radio, outsourcing the
procurement & projects to BECIL, by keeping the Prasar
Bharati Board as a mute spectator. It is also learnt
that there is a serious planning to enstrust the OB Coverages of Doordarshan with one
outside agency. All
National Federation
of
Akashvani and Doordarshan Employees (NFADE)
Room
no. 333, Akashvani Bhawan,
New Delhi-110001
- 3 -
these activities show that the Prasar
Bharati Act is applicable only against the interest
of the organisation and its employees.
The seriousness of the threat will be clear
if u can read in between the lines of these proposals and the decision of the GoM to extend funds from Govt of
India to meet the expenditure on salary head for next five years (only).
The basic question should arise in everybody’s mind that what will happened
after 5 years of support from the Govt. ? It is known
to everybody that the Govt became serious on the
existence of AIR & DD only after the united movements of the Federation
after 2004, even though the funding system of PB changed from 1st
April 2004. Now the concept may be:- once almost all
basic services of AIR & DD are outsourced, they can concentrate on the
outsourcing of Operation & maintenance also. The day will come, when the
existing regular staff, they themselves will be compelled to leave the
organization when the Management gets enough opportunity to show that the
existing staff are redundant. On other words, the Govt/PB
will push us to the same direction, where the employees has to be handed over
to the surplus cell if they do not opt for the corporation which is not in a
position to pay the salaries in time despite the financial support from the
govt. It is very clear that the days are numbered for us if we are not
utilizing the time with our full enthusiasm. It is upto
the Govt to bring the Bill for amendments in the Act;
but it is for the Hon’ble Parliament to decide to
make amendments in the Act or ultimately to repeal (withdraw) the Act. It will
depend upon the interest of our members to bring the real picture of Prasar Bharati before the Hon’ble Parliament of India.