PDD Employees welfare funds failed to take off in J&K

Tahir Mushtaq

JAMMU, Feb 28: The much hyped Employees Welfare Fund scheme launched by Power Development Department (PDD) has not been implemented in Jammu region, despite the fact that employees are contributing money to the scheme for last six months.

Official sources said that while some compensation claims have been cleared in Kashmir valley, but in Jammu region none of the person injured during duty hours have received any help from the scheme since it was launched in February this year. The fund is aimed to cover 32,000 permanent employees of the department.

The scheme was launched under order No-77 of PDD in both the regions of the state to provide insurance cover to the permanent employees of the department, particularly who work in field.

“It was to cover the employees from Class IV to the Engineers and above who in case of death or injury are supposed to get assistance of Rs 3 lakh as immediate assistance”, said a PDD employee. The scheme also intends to provide free education and health benefits to the family members of the employee.

When a senior officer said, “We have taken up the issue with the concerned division and we will ensure that it gets implemented properly”. He said that department is making efforts to create effective mechanism so that employees get the benefits of the fund.

Sources said that seriousness of the officials could be gauged from the fact that even District Welfare Committees, Provincial Welfare Committees and Central Welfare Committee required to generate data of the workers working in respective zones have not been completed thus pushing back the basic objective of the scheme.

Each employee at present is contributing money ranging from Rs 200-to Rs 50 per month to the fund and State Government was also supposed to contribute to this scheme.

It is pertinent to mention here that it is not only the permanent employees who are facing the problems due to non-implementation of various schemes in the Department, but even the daily wagers who are backbone of the maintenance and distribution system have been denied their rights.

Nearly 5000 daily wagers working in PDD have so far not provided cover of Janata Insurance scheme, aimed at providing insurance to the daily rate workers who mostly work in the field.

“Though the state government has assured that it will be implemented but so far nothing has been done in this regard. In absence of any insurance cover most of the injured workers have not received any financial help from the department”, said Tarun Gupta, state president of Daily wagers Association.