Ministers, legislators give themselves a pay hike

Karnataka ministers and legislators on Monday unanimously voted for a substantive hike in their salaries and allowances, which will burden the state exchequer by an additional Rs 47.5 crore a year.

Two bills which provide for the hikes - the Karnataka Ministers Salaries and Allowances (Amendment) Bill, 2015 and the Karnataka Legislature Salaries, Pensions and allowances (Amendment) Bill, 2015 were passed in the legislature without any debate. However, the bills did not give a clear picture of the quantum of take-home benefits of each minister and legislator.

This is the Siddaramaiah-led government’s maiden upward revision of salaries and perks. The last revision was in 2011.

The total hike in salaries and allowances for a cabinet minister (excluding travel and daily allowance) works out to around Rs 78,000 a month, while a minister of state will receive Rs 79,000 and a legislator Rs 50,000 a month.

The Chief Minister’s salary will go up from Rs 30,000 to Rs 50,000 a month. Cabinet rank ministers will get Rs 40,000 salary a month, up from Rs 25,000, while the salaries of ministers of state will be almost doubled from the present Rs 16,000 a month to Rs 35,000 a month.

That’s not all. The sumptuary allowance, house rent and house maintenance allowance provided to ministers  (both cabinet and minister of state rank) are proposed to be  doubled.
A Cabinet minister who at present gets Rs 1.5 lakh per annum as sumptuary allowance (which can be used for any purpose) will be getting Rs three lakh per annum; similarly, for a minister of state sumptuary allowance is proposed to be hiked from Rs 80,000 per annum to Rs two lakh.

The house rent allowance of all ministers is proposed to be hiked from Rs 40,000 to Rs 80,000 per month and house maintenance allowance from Rs 10,000 to Rs 20,000 per month. Conveyance allowance is proposed to be hiked from cost of 750 litres of petrol to 1,000 litres of petrol per month. Travel allowance is proposed to be hiked from Rs 20 per km to Rs 30 per km.

The salaries of the Chairman of Council and Speaker of Assembly are proposed to be hiked on par with that of the chief minister. Leader of the Opposition, Deputy Speaker and Chief Whip are also beneficiaries of the salary hikes.

The salary of legislators is proposed to be hiked to Rs 25,000 per month from the existing Rs 20,000. Pension is proposed to be provided at Rs 40,000 per month instead of the present Rs 25,000. A legislator who completes five years will be paid an additional pension of Rs 1,000 per month on completion of every subsequent year.

Legislators also voted for substantial hikes in constituency travel allowance (from Rs 25,000 to Rs 40,000), telephone allowance (from Rs 15,000 to Rs 20,000 a month) and constituency allowance (from Rs 15,000 to Rs 40,000 a month).