Himachal Pradesh Chief Minister Sukhvinder Singh Sukhu Monday “held in abeyance” a September 6 notification withdrawing higher pay grade to the state government staff, the move coming amid protests by employee unions and the opposition BJP. The notification affected about 14,000 employees, who would have suffered a loss ranging from Rs 5,000 to 15,000 per month.
The state government on Saturday had notified the HP Civil Services (Revised Pay) Second Amendment Rules 2025, omitting section 7A of the rules inserted on January 3, 2022 by the previous BJP government. “Rule 7A…shall be deemed to have been omitted with effect from January 3, 2022. The pay of the Government employees shall be refixed as if rule 7A was never inserted…. No recovery shall be made of any overpayment detected consequent upon re-fixation of pay under sub-rule (2),” read the notification.
On Monday, however, Sukhu said that the notification to remove Rule 7A shall be held in abeyance as “the government was committed to safeguarding the interests of the employees and issuing such a notification was not justified”. “While making amendments in rules and regulations, humanitarian concerns must always be kept in mind,” he added.
Later, the Chief Minister’s Office (CMO) issued a statement: “Following the directions of Chief Minister…the notification to remove Rule 7A from the Himachal Pradesh Civil Services (Revised Pay) Rules, 2022, issued on 6th September,2025, shall be held in abeyance”.
The U-Turn came amid strong opposition by the BJP, which said that Himachal Pradesh has become the first state in the country where the government has reduced its employees’ salaries.
Senior BJP leader and former union Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad said, “Listen to the story of Himachal Pradesh. When the BJP government was in power, it increased the salaries of government employees to provide relief, but the current Congress government has cut their salaries, citing the poor financial condition of the state”.
“Is deceiving the public before elections the only way the Congress knows? Can the so-called ‘Khatakhat model’ solve farmers’ issues? Can it address youth unemployment? Whether it is Karnataka, Himachal Pradesh, or Telangana, the Congress’s governance record everywhere is abysmal. The truth is that Congress lacks policy, intent, and capability. Governing is simply not within their reach. They cheat the people, make grand claims, and when it’s time to take responsibility, they start crying,” said Prasad, adding that the “Congress government in Himachal has become so helpless that it is even trying to dispose of government vehicles…this is the real face of the Congress, and this is what a collapsing economy looks like”.
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Earlier in the day in Shimla, over five hundred government employees under the banner of the Himachal Pradesh Secretariat Employee Union gathered near the Secretariat building, and launched a protest.
Representatives of secretariat employees’ associations met Sukhu and requested him to withdraw the notification. Sukhu assured them that the present government was committed to safeguarding the interests of employees, as per an official statement.
“No government employee will suffer due to the notification issued two days ago. The notification will be implemented for the new government employees,” Sukhu said, adding a mistake made in the notification would be rectified. “Employees receiving double increments before 2022 will continue to receive it. The government will not reverse payments already made,” he said. “If any clarification errors existed, they would be corrected and employees would not face obstacles from the government,” the chief minister said.
Federation of Secretarial Employees Union in a statement said that the amendment in rules would have affected 14,000 employees in 89 categories, who would have suffered losses between Rs 13,000 and Rs 14,000 per month.
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He said the unions had met the chief minister and urged for withdrawing the notification regarding the amended rules. When no order was issued for withdrawing the September 6 notification, the employees marched to the CM’s official residence, where Sukhu addressed the employees and said that the notification had been put in abeyance.
State BJP general secretary and member of parliament Sikender Kumar hoped hope that the notification that has been kept in abeyance “would never be implemented”.
“One thing has become clear that the government is ‘anti-employees’ and had taken many decisions detrimental to the interests of the employees. Whenever the employees opposed the decisions, cases were registered against them,” he said, adding the Congress government wants to get the work done by putting pressure on employees, he said in a statement.
The section 7A provided that the posts/categories, whose Pay Band or Grade Pay was not re-revised after implementation of Revised (Pay) Rules, 2009, the pay in applicable Level in Pay Matrix as on January 1, 2016, shall be obtained by multiplying the existing basic pay as on December 31, 2015, by factor 2.59 while the multiplying factor would be 2.25 after omitting section 7A of the Rules.
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The implication of the amended rules would be that the multiplying factor for revision of the pay will be 0.34 less, and the basic pay would have reduced proportionately after re-fixation.
