Old pension scheme stopped by Samajwadi Party govt: Yogi Adityanath

Image Source : PTI
Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath

Highlights

By promising to restore old pension scheme, Akhilesh is aiming to woo 28 lakh govt employees
However, Adityanath claimed that it was Akhilesh's father who stopped the old pension scheme
Yogi Adityanath alleged that govt employees had never been the Samajwadi Party's priority

Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath has alleged that the old pension scheme was stopped during the Samajwadi Party tenure. He said this while responding to Akhilesh Yadav's promise that his party if forms the government after the upcoming polls, will restore the old pension scheme of the state government employees.

"(Akhilesh's) 'abba jaan' (Mulayam Singh) was the Chief Minister when the old pension scheme was done away with in 2005," the firebrand BJP leader said.

Assembly Elections 2022: FULL COVERAGE

Adityanath said that government employees had never been the Samajwadi Party's priority. "He (Akhilesh) himself was the Chief Minister for 5 years but no such measure was taken," he said.

Deputy CM Dinesh Sharma said that the Samajwadi Party supremo had no problem during his tenure. “If Akhilesh disliked the new pension scheme then why did he not reverse the decision of your own SP government?” he asked.

Samajwadi Party national president Akhilesh Yadav had last week announced that the SP government will restore the old pension scheme, benefitting lakhs of state government employees who have been agitating for the same for long, as well as the Yash Bharti awards.

"On coming to power, the Samajwadi Party will restore the old pension scheme, which will benefit the teachers, employees and officers of the state government. I have already held discussions with the employees and economic experts and have found out that we will be able to arrange funds for it by creating a corpus," he had said.

"We will seek the support of the state government employees in the upcoming Assembly election on the issue of pension," the SP chief said.

According to Akhilesh, the BJP government had brought a new manual through which the employees appointed after April 2005 were denied this support and security on retirement.

The employees have held agitations demanding the restoration of the old pension scheme. They have alleged that the new pension scheme depends on the share market and therefore, has uncertainty attached to it.

The Uttar Pradesh Assembly polls are scheduled to be held in seven phases from February 10 to March 7 and the counting of votes will be taken up on March 10.