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CPT unions against rollback of retirement age

Debaprosad Lahiri

THE Calcutta port has shelved, at least for the time being, the proposal to rollback the retirement age from 60 years to 58 in the face of stiff opposition from the workers' representatives on the board of the Calcutta Port Trust (CPT). The Calc utta Dock Labour Board (CDLB) too has disapproved the proposal, according to CDLB sources.

Many years ago, when the Major Port Trust Act had not been enacted and the activities of the port were under the supervision of the Commissioners of the Port of Calcutta, the then port administration had adopted the Fundamental Rules (FR) of the Centre a s the statutory guidelines for determining service conditions of its employees.

In 1974, during the wage revision exercise, the then Wage Revision Committee had suggested to dispense with the sole anomaly that had persisted in regard to the retirement of age of Class IV and other categories of employees of the port. While the retire ment age of class IV employees was 60 years, for others it was 58, at par with the Central Government employees. The port administration incorporated the suggestion and, accordingly, all employees were to retire at 58 years.

In 1998, when the Centre amended the FR and the retirement age was raised to 60 years, CPT also accepted the amendment.

Now, the contention of the unions is that unless the FR is amended by the Centre appropriately, the rollback to 58 will be anomalous and, therefore, unacceptable to them, according to a CPT board member.

Meanwhile, the Ministry of Surface Transport in a note to the authorities of the major ports has noted: ``There are lots of surplus workers in various categories in major ports and there is a need to reduce the workforce sufficiently.'' The measures sugg ested included introduction of an attractive VRS, rational manning pattern and the rollback of retirement age. The note mentions: ``It is for consideration whether in ports having excess manpower, the retirement age which was enhanced from 58-60 years ma y be again reduced to 58 years. By this exercise, many persons between 58 and 60 shall retire. Mumbai port has already done this''.

At the end of 1999 (as on December 31, 1999), the Mumbai port had a strength of 25,291 workers followed by Calcutta (16,607) and Chennai (10,252), excluding the workforce under the respective Dock Labour Boards (DLB). The erstwhile Mumbai DLB recorded 4, 877 employees and at Calcutta and Chennai they were 2,725 and 2,114 respectively.

The enhancement of the retirement age by two years, from 58 to 60 years, slapped an additional financial burden on the Calcutta port as the ratio of the monthly salary and the monthly pension at any particular point in the scale is about 2:1. To achieve the financial stability in the long run, CPT, it was felt, therefore, should seriously consider reducing the retirement age to 58 years from the present 60. With this reduction, about 2,500 employees would go, entailing a saving of Rs. 19 crores per year .

According to the views expressed by Mr. H. P. Roy, Chairman, CPT, the shortfall in adequate return on the capital employed (according to the guidelines of the Tariff Authority of Major Ports) cannot be made good in totality until the size of the establis hment is scaled down to a level of 10,000 employees, which can be expected during the next seven years in the normal process of retirement.

A trade union leader said: ``With the prevailing ban on fresh recruitment for the last several years and an increasing trend of traffic on the other hand, the port is already facing acute shortage of manpower and further reduction of 2,500 employees at o ne stroke, would precipitate a crisis.''

Citing an example, he said: ``About 20 senior engineers (the Chief Engineer, all the four deputies and several senior executive engineers) along with a number of experienced staff will retire as soon as the retirement age is rolled back to 58 years. One is not sure if the normal working of the engineering department can still be maintained properly if so many people are forced to go in one stroke''.