Gujarat to bear an additional Rs 6,000-cr burden under 7th Pay Commission

With the central government Cabinet approving Seventh Pay Commission, Gujarat will see an additional burden of roughly Rs 6000 crore based on the 23.5 per cent hike.

However, the state government will not be levying any new taxes or hike existing taxes to recover the same, according to state government sources.

In 2014-15, the salaries and pensions cost the state exchequer around Rs 28,000 crore for its 8,67,000 employees and pensioners.

Out of the Rs 28,000 crore, roughly Rs 6,800 crore was spent for salaries of state government employees, Rs 7,300 crore for panchayat employees, Rs 1,300 crore for employees of local institutes of self-governance and Rs 5,300 crore for paying salaries of grant-in-aid educational institutes' employees.

Further, Rs 8800 crore were spent in 2014-15 for state pensioners. According to the state government, the additional burden will be borne by the state government without levying any new taxes.

It needs to be mentioned here that the total expenditure on salaries and pensions of Rs 28000 crore, grew by roughly 10 per cent over the previous year's Rs 25,000 crore.