Officials float raising salaries for president, PM: Source

Some officials have proposed starting discussions on raising the salaries of the president, prime minister, ministers and lawmakers after a major pay hike was approved for public employees last month, Cabinet sources have said.

The sources pointed to previous instances when public employee pay hikes were followed by discussions on extending similar benefits to those at the top of the state and government.

One source also claimed that the pay hike for public employees under the recently announced 9th Pay Scale significantly increases the salaries of the top-tier public servants, namely secretaries, compared with those of the top-tier public representatives, namely the president and the prime minister.

This huge gap naturally creates anomalies between the ranks and status, where the president and prime minister are ranked first and second, while a secretary is ranked 16th.

It undermines the status of a prime minister and president, who earn Tk1,20,000 and Tk1,15,000, respectively, while the secretary earns Tk1,56,000 per month under the new pay scale.

The president, prime minister and cabinet ministers enjoy other benefits not available for public servants like spacious and up-to-date residential facilities, top-tier transport services, and support staff.

Still, the new anomaly in the salary structure naturally warrants discussions on hikes for the president, prime minister and other cabinet members, the source said, preferring anonymity.

However, some lawmakers and officials at the cabinet have downplayed the prospects of a pay hike for the president and prime minister soon.

The ongoing socio-economic downturn in the country has put pressure on household budgets, and a hike for the public representatives at this time would generally upset the people, and draw criticisms from government critics, some officials said.

Public representatives have to answer to the people and have to reflect people’s concerns in their actions and words, these officials said. Therefore, a prime minister or a cabinet minister cannot simply approve a pay hike for them whenever they feel it necessary in the same way they can for public employees.

Lakshmipur-1 lawmaker Shahadat Hossain told a media outlet that the salaries members of parliament get are paltry when taking into consideration the present inflation trend. However, owning to the ongoing economic crisis, lawmakers are neither raising demands for pay hikes to uphold their status against that of government employees – nor are they against the prospect of a hike, Shahadat said.