10-06-2006, 12:01 AM
<b>Party time for comrades as CPM announces pay hike </b><!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->New Delhi: After making them slog for decades for a pittance, the Left has finally decided to hike the wages of its full-time activists to give them a slightly better standard of living.
Across the country, "whole timers" - as they are known - <b>are eagerly waiting for the windfall promised to them by the Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M), which pays a monthly fixed wage, or salary, to its estimated 25,000 activists.</b>
<b>The lowest monthly slab is now Rs 1,500, which is barely enough to give a decent lifestyle.</b>
If the CPM decision to pay its "whole timers" the minimum wages prescribed by Centre and state governments for unskilled labour is implemented, this amount is likely to rise by a few hundred rupees.
That, party activists say, is something they badly require. "It's a good step," said K Veeriah, a 32-year-old activist who has been with the party since 1997.
Veeriah, who works at the <b>CPM headquarters here as a personal assistant to politburo member Sitaram Yechury, earns Rs 3,300 a month - just a few hundred more than what courier company delivery boys in the city get. Mercifully, his accommodation and family's medical expenses are taken care of by the party</b>.
But he doesn't get to take home even the meagre monthly amount that comes his way although that is less than the notified wage for an unskilled labourer in the national capital.
Worse,<b> Veeriah has to pay around Rs 600 to the party as "levy" annually. This is mandatory for all members.</b>
But Veeriah, the single breadwinner in his family that includes a school-going child, says he does not feel bad. "We find it difficult to meet the expenses in an expensive city like Delhi. It is our commitment to ideology that drives us," Veeriah told IANS.
But mere ideology, the party is realising, cannot fill people's stomachs, not in this age. The CPM says it does not differentiate between the wages of an ordinary "whole timer" and a party leader. Even Yechury or party general secretary Prakash Karat draw more or less the same amount as the others.
<b>But senior leaders get some extra facilities because they need to travel more and interact with people. "They will get vehicles too," </b>explained Roopchand Pal, a college lecturer-turned-CPM Lok Sabha MP from West Bengal.
The party decides a full timer's wage on the basis of the living expenses of the place where he works. <b>If his spouse is employed, the amount would be less</b>. According to Pal, the party stands by members who are in distress.
However, P Karunakaran, an MP from Kerala, pointed out that most members including some MPs found it difficult to make both ends meet. <b>An MP earning Rs 26,000 as salary, including the constituency allowance, gives backs Rs19,500 to the party.</b>
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Who is paying commies?
Across the country, "whole timers" - as they are known - <b>are eagerly waiting for the windfall promised to them by the Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M), which pays a monthly fixed wage, or salary, to its estimated 25,000 activists.</b>
<b>The lowest monthly slab is now Rs 1,500, which is barely enough to give a decent lifestyle.</b>
If the CPM decision to pay its "whole timers" the minimum wages prescribed by Centre and state governments for unskilled labour is implemented, this amount is likely to rise by a few hundred rupees.
That, party activists say, is something they badly require. "It's a good step," said K Veeriah, a 32-year-old activist who has been with the party since 1997.
Veeriah, who works at the <b>CPM headquarters here as a personal assistant to politburo member Sitaram Yechury, earns Rs 3,300 a month - just a few hundred more than what courier company delivery boys in the city get. Mercifully, his accommodation and family's medical expenses are taken care of by the party</b>.
But he doesn't get to take home even the meagre monthly amount that comes his way although that is less than the notified wage for an unskilled labourer in the national capital.
Worse,<b> Veeriah has to pay around Rs 600 to the party as "levy" annually. This is mandatory for all members.</b>
But Veeriah, the single breadwinner in his family that includes a school-going child, says he does not feel bad. "We find it difficult to meet the expenses in an expensive city like Delhi. It is our commitment to ideology that drives us," Veeriah told IANS.
But mere ideology, the party is realising, cannot fill people's stomachs, not in this age. The CPM says it does not differentiate between the wages of an ordinary "whole timer" and a party leader. Even Yechury or party general secretary Prakash Karat draw more or less the same amount as the others.
<b>But senior leaders get some extra facilities because they need to travel more and interact with people. "They will get vehicles too," </b>explained Roopchand Pal, a college lecturer-turned-CPM Lok Sabha MP from West Bengal.
The party decides a full timer's wage on the basis of the living expenses of the place where he works. <b>If his spouse is employed, the amount would be less</b>. According to Pal, the party stands by members who are in distress.
However, P Karunakaran, an MP from Kerala, pointed out that most members including some MPs found it difficult to make both ends meet. <b>An MP earning Rs 26,000 as salary, including the constituency allowance, gives backs Rs19,500 to the party.</b>
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Who is paying commies?