The government on Saturday assured the members of parliament that it would re-look at their salary hike approved by the Union Cabinet, thus bringing an end to the ruckus in the Parliament over MPs salary hike.
Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee called a meeting early on Saturday with RJD chief Lalu Prasad, SP `s Mulayam Singh and BJP leader Gopinath Munde. The meeting was intended to find a solution to the salary issue. The Finance Minister also assured Lalu and Mulayam that thegovernment would look into the matter.
On Friday, when it looked that the issue related to hike in salary of MPs is settled, Samajwadi Party, Bahujan Samaj Party and Rashtriya Janata Dal members forced the adjournment of the Lok Sabha, voicing dissatisfaction over the quantum of salary hike for MPs.
Eralier, salaries of Members of Parliament was hiked by more than three times with the Union Cabinet on Friday approving a bill. A meeting of the Cabinet gave its nod to the bill under which the basic salary of the MPs will be hiked from Rs 16,000 to Rs 50,000 per month. Sources said that the Cabinet also approved an increase in the office expense of parliamentarians from Rs 20,000 to Rs 40,000 per month. The constituency allowance has also been doubled from Rs 20,000 to Rs 40,000 per month.
But, this is much less than the figure of Rs 80,001 recommended by the parliamentary committee which had said MPs should get more thangovernment secretaries as the former are above them in the hierarchy.
The limit for interest-free loan for MPs for buying a personal vehicle has been hiked four-fold to Rs 4 lakh from the present Rs 1 lakh. Thegovernment also approved a hike in road mileage rate for vehicles used by MPs from Rs 13 per km to Rs 16 per km. The spouse of a parliamentarian can now travel any number of times in first class or executive class, the sources said.
Earlier, SP chief Mulayam Singh Yadav and RJD supremo Lalu Prasad claimed that the government had insulted Parliament by rejecting the recommendation of its committee to raise the basic salary to Rs 80,001 per month.
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