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Amidst the ongoing strike of state
government employees in Jammu and Kashmir, the business of channel
partners in the Jammu region has been hit very badly. The state
government employees are on strike as they want their pending Sixth
Pay Commission arrears to be cleared and retirement age to be raised
from 58 to 60. The J&K Government needs close to Rs 4,300 crore
to clear the pending arrears. In the middle of all this, the 200
channel partner community in Jammu is worried about getting their
payments cleared from the government amounting to Rs 15 crore. The
community is also apprehensive about future buying from the
government's side. “The government offices are closed owing to the
strike and I have not been able to get my payment of Rs 3 crore
cleared. The business has also seen a 30 percent dip during in the
last one month. In Jammu, the main business vertical is the
government colleges and offices and the army. On an average, the
market does 30-40 percent of its business with the government. But,
it has not been happening of late. We have not got any orders in the
last one month. We are worried if the government is not able to pay
the state government employees, how will they buy material from the
IT channel community,” said a worried Arvind Koul of Microcomp
Systems and also the President of Jammu Computer Dealers Association
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Another partner in Jammu revealed how
his business has been hit in the last month. “Last year in March,
we did good business with the government. But this period between
March-April is on the slower side. I have only done 70 percent of the
business in comparison to last year,” said Sanjay Langar of AMG
Sales Corporation based in Jammu. On the issue of uncleared payments,
he added, “My payments of around Rs 2 crore has not been cleared by
the government due to the ongoing strike. I hope the strike ends at
the earliest, so that we can get our money back.” Few locals have
also tried speaking to the state government officials as far as
payments are concerned. One such partner is Sanjay Gupta of Infotech
Systems who is waiting for a payment of Rs 60 lakh from the
government. “We are held up as are payments are not cleared. We
went to the office of the Chief Secretary of Jammu and Kashmir and he
gave assurances that the cheques have been made. Payments will be
made only when the strike gets over,” concluded Gupta.
The strike by the state government
employees started on April 3, and will continue till April 13.
Partners in Jammu hope normalcy will be restored in the business once
the strike is over.