Govt wants public sector insurers rejig first, unions demand wage revision

Venkatachari Jagannathan

Chennai, Aug 29 (IANS) The talks between the unions in the four public sector general insurers, General Insurance Corporation of India (GIC Re), their management and the government has ended in a stalemate, said industry officials.

The meeting took place on Saturday. The four are: The Oriental Insurance Company Limited, National Insurance Company Limited, The New India Assurance Company Limited and United India Insurance Company Limited.

"The management and the government wanted to discuss the restructuring of the four primary insures as suggested by the Ernst & Young (EY) whereas the unions wanted the wage revision to be completed first before other issues are taken up," an official told IANS.

Earlier, the General Insurers' (Public Sector) Association of India (GIPSA) had informed the unions in the four general insurers that a meeting with the heads of the above companies, General Managers has been called on August 27 morning at Faridabad. The meeting would be chaired by Saurabh Mishra, Joint Secretary, Department of Financial Services, GIPSA had said.

In a communication to the unions, GIPSA -- the lobby body for the four public sector general insurers -- had said: "The wage revision will be based on the performance of each PSGIC (public sector general insurance company) and each individual within the Company."

"Wage revision of each employee to be linked with the performance of the organisation and his/her own performance," GIPSA had said.

According to GIPSA, the primary component of the wage revision will be variable (performance based). However, a small fixed component of the pay shall be towards the cost of living adjustment during each appraisal and wage revision cycle.

On the organisational rejig study done by EY, the GIPSA had told the unions that the diagnose phase is just over and the design phase is going to commence shortly.

"Hence, this is the appropriate time when the findings of the Diagnose phase should be shared with Employees' Unions/Associations and their inputs are gathered which can be gainfully utilised while designing and thereafter implementing the Project," GIPSA had said.

Sources told IANS, at the meeting held on Saturday the management and government wanted to focus on the recommendations of EY on restructuring of the four companies.

But the unions insisted that wage revision should precede other things, officials told IANS.

The management had told the Unions that it would look at the possibilities of revising upwards their earlier offer

The unions want the wage revision to be better or at par with that of what was offered to the employees of Life Insurance Corporation of India (LIC).

Meanwhile in social media a document was in circulation justifying higher wage revision for the public sector general insurance employees and GIC Re than what was offered to LIC employees.

According to the message, the collective net profit of the public sector general insurance companies and GIC Re, their collective between FY2012-2017 (wage revision period) was Rs 20,808 crore whereas for LIC it was Rs 9,668 crore.

The per employee profitability of public sector non-life insurers and GIC Re for the period under review was about Rs 41 lakh (about 50,000 employees) as compared to about Rs 8.4 lakh of LIC's per employee (total employees about 1.14 lakh), the message notes.

(Venkatachari Jagannathan can be reached at [email protected])