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Anomalies in the Pay Revision and Fixation of Pension of University and college
Teachers

V.P.Jain*

The retired university teachers are highly concerned about the Government’s policy of
exclusion with regard to revision of their pension. Since the MHRD and the UGC have
not notified the pension revision for retired teachers so far, the pension of most of the
retired teachers in the university of Delhi and its constituent colleges has been fixed in an
arbitrary manner in total disregard to the provisions of the sixth pay committee report.

“A major question that the Pay Review committee had to contend with was the
nomenclature of various categories of teaching positions. At present there are varied
practices, namely, Lecturer, Reader and Professor in some institutions and Assistant
Professor, Associate Professor and Professor are used in others. Moreover, the
nomenclature ‘Reader’ was not so easily comprehended by a large section of the society”
(Chadda Committee Report).

In order to remove this confusion the UGC and the MHRD have decided that,
henceforth, there shall be only three designations in respect of teachers in universities and
colleges, namely, Assistant Professors, Associate Professors and Professors. (MHRD
Notification dated December 31st,2008)
The pay scale of Rs. 12000-420-18300 has been notionally bi-furcated for the purpose
of pay revision of university and college teachers. Incumbent Readers and Lecturers
(Selection Grade) who had not completed three years in the pay scale of Rs. 12000-18300
on 1.1.2006 shall be placed at the appropriate stage in the Pay Band of Rs. 15600-39100
with AGP of Rs. 8000 till they complete 3 years of service in the grade of Lecturer
(Selection Grade)/Reader, and thereafter shall be placed in the higher Pay Band of
Rs.37400-67000 and accordingly re-designated as Associate Professor. This is an obvious
anomaly. If a teacher who has been promoted as a reader is not eligible to be re-
designated as an Associate professor than he cannot remain designated as a reader either,
for the two terms are identical. He would have to be demoted as a lecturer or as an
assistant professor depending on the practice followed in a university. Similarly,
Associate Professors who had not completed three years in the pay scale of Rs. 12000-
18300 on 1.1.2006 shall also be placed at the appropriate stage in the Pay Band of Rs.
15600-39100 with AGP of Rs. 8000 till they complete 3 years of service in the pre
revised grade of Associate Professor. Placement of teachers in higher Pay Band of
Rs.37400-67000 is not, therefore, contingent on the tag of designation as is erroneously
stated, but on one’s attaining the cut off basic pay of Rs. 13260 in the pay scale of Rs.
12000-18300. This anomaly has now been rectified in the fitment tables notified by
MHRD. Table -3 and table-4 for fixation of pay of teachers in the pre revised pay scale of
12000-420-18300 use the nomenclature of ‘Reader’ for both the categories.
One must also ponder over the anomaly that lecturers in selection grade who are ranked
lower than readers would be placed in PB-4 after completion of three years of service on
1-1-2006 and also re-designated as Associate Professors and thus eligible for higher
pension (minimum of Rs. 23200). It is against natural justice to accord readers lower
status by placing them (notionally) in PB-3 even if they had completed three years of
service before 2006. The pension of readers who had retired prior to 2006 would thus be
lower than lecturers(selection grade) even though they enjoyed higher status. Moreover,
there will be a yawning gap between the pension of readers who retired before January
2006 and who retired later, a totally arbitrary cut off date. This is precisely the kind of
anomaly which has been highlighted by the army officers and their demand for one rank
one pay has been accepted by the Hon’ble Supreme Court.
A lecturer/assistant professor is promoted as reader/associate professor according to the
same UGC regulations ( same pay scale and same promotion criteria) and the choice of
nomenclature is merely (as observed in Chadda Committee report) a matter of practice,
and should not be misconstrued as a reflection on one’s merit. Likewise, depending on
one’s proclivity, one could achieve the same uniformity by re-designating all associate
professors as readers. Consequently, not to re-designate all readers as associate
professors, which is sought to be done for the sake of uniformity and to “remove the
prevailing confusion”, is to rank one nomenclature higher than the other and introduces
an absurd status bias in favour of one practice to the determent of the other. Logic
demands that all readers should be re-designated as Associate Professors , and Associate
Professors in all universities, including Delhi University, be placed in PB-3 PB-4
depending on whether one has crossed the threshold basic pay of 13260 or not. This is
precisely how it would obtain in universities like JNU where the current practice has been
to designate their faculty as Assistant Professor, Associate Professor and Professor, the
practice the MHRD and the UGC has directed to be followed by all universities in future.
We wish to submit that all the teachers who retired as readers or in equivalent grade in
the universities and their constituent colleges and who had superannuated before January
1st, 2006, and fulfill the criteria to be eligible to be placed in PB-4 for present incumbents
be applicable to them also for the purpose of fixation of their pension. The substantive
issue is that the teachers who retired in the pre-revised pay scale of 1200-18300 and had
put in more than three years of service would as alleles of their counterpart in service
now would be governed by the same benchmark of pay fixation. They should also be
deemed to be re-designated as Associate Professors if you so please ( it is like renaming a
file which does not alter the contents) but that, in any case is a moot point. Moreover, At
the time of Vth Pay Commission vide HRD Notification No.F.1-22/97-U.I dated 6th
November, 1998 the pay of Lecturers (Selection Grade)/ Readers was fixed at the
minimum of Rs.14940/- in the revised scale of Rs.12000-420-18300 as and when they
completed five years in the grade. This was agreed upon in lieu of Senior Reader Grade
of Rs.14300-400-18300 which the then Government had offered to Readers on
completion of 5 years of service in the grade. Notionally, therefore, all readers who had
completed five years on 1-1-2006 or earlier should deemed to be placed in the Senior
Reader Grade of Rs 14940-420-18300 and their revised pay scale as per the Sixth Pay
Committee is PB-4.
Therefore, the pension of readers//lecturers (Selection Grade) who had served for three
years or more in the pre revised grade of 12000-18300 should be fixed at. 50% of the
minimum pay in PB-4 of Rs. 37000-67000 with AGP of Rs. 9000 i.e. at Rs 23200. The
Sixth Pay committee recommendation in this regard is totally unambiguous: “in
accordance with the instructions contained in Para 4.2 of the office memorandum of the
department of personnel, Govt. of India, dated 1-9-2008, the fixation of pension will be
subject to the provision that the revised pension in no case shall be lower than 50% of the
sum of the minimum of the pay band and the grade pay corresponding to the pre-revised
scale from which the pensioner had retired”.
Now the MHRD has notified the fitment tables for the fixation of pay of the existing
incumbents who were in position as on 1-1-2006.in various categories of posts in
universities and colleges. Hopefully, the fitment table for pensioners would also be
notified soon, which would be just and honourable.
* Convener, DELHI UNIVERSITY RETIRED TEACHERS ASSOCIATION