ISLAMABAD: The government employees across Pakistan have announced another sit-in in front of Parliament House on Monday, February 15, to get their demands approved, including pay rise.
According to details, the decision was taken by officials of various trade unions after important consultations at the Islamabad Press Club on Saturday evening.
All Pakistan Employees Unions officials have informed they will protest in front of Parliament House until their demands are met. “Sit-ins will be staged in all areas adjacent to Parliament House, D-Chowk and the Secretariat,” they added.
A few days earlier, Islamabad’s Red Zone turned into a war zone as the federal government employees and security personnel clashed throughout the day in the heavily-guarded area.
The protesters were demanding increase in their salaries in accordance with the prevailing inflation. Protesting under the umbrella of All Government Employees Grand Alliance, the public servants had announced a sit-in at Pak Secretariat till their salaries were increased.
On Wednesday morning, over 2,000 employees of Pak Secretariat gathered inside the premises to stage a protest and locked the main entrance to the secretariat. The police started arresting the protesters, and shortly afterwards resorted to teargas shelling and the protesters retaliated and pelted the police with stones.
Later on Thursday, addressing a press conference Defence Minister Pervez Khattak announced a 25 percent increase in the salaries of federal government employees from grades 1 to 19 on an “ad-hoc” basis.
Elaborating upon the implementation of the ad-hoc relief in today’s press conference, Khattak said it would be added to the pay scales in the budget that will be announced in June.
Announcing other decisions of the government committee, the defence minister said it had decided upon the process of upgradation for all government employees which would be carried out after the budget announcement in June.
