MEPMA employees want pay scale implemented as per GO 157

The Mission for Elimination of Poverty in Municipal Areas was established in the year 2007 for formulating strategies to implement poverty reduction programmes in urban areas.

Kothagudem: Telangana MEPMA (IKP-Urban) Employees Association has demanded the State government to implement pay scale for the staff working in urban local bodies in the State.

The Mission for Elimination of Poverty in Municipal Areas (MEPMA) was established in the year 2007 for formulating strategies to implement poverty reduction programmes in urban areas. It is the state nodal agency for implementing various components of the union government.

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There are as many as 378 fixed tenure employees such as community organisers, town mission coordinators, district mission coordinators, data entry operators cum junior assistants and others working in 141 urban local bodies besides GHMC.

Speaking to Telangana Today, the association district general secretary Shaik Nazaar Ahmed informed that the MEPMA staff plays a crucial role in taking the government’s welfare schemes to the targeted sections and creating awareness among the urban poor about income generation activities. But they are forced to face financial difficulties due to meager wages.

The union leaders appealed to the previous BRS government to extend the pay scale, which the government announced for fixed tenure employees (FTEs) of the Society for Elimination of Rural Poverty (SERP) 23 years after the society was set up, to the MEPMA staff as well.

Following the request from the union, the government in August, 2023 issued a GO 157 fixing the pay scale to the existing FTEs of MEPMA.

Though the SERP employees are being paid wages through treasury but the same privilege has not been extended to MEPMA employees so far for reasons unknown, Ahmed said.

He said the union members met Deputy Chief Minister Bhatti Vikramarka four months ago and urged him to implement the pay scale as per the GO 157. Though Vikramarka agreed to implement the pay scale there has been no progress since then.

The union district president B Venkateshwarlu and Ahmed appealed to the government to take immediate measures to implement the pay scale as per the GO 157.