Bhubaneswar: Nearly four lakh state government employees are yet to get their salary for the month of March.

The state's finance department has blamed the delay on the damage to the Human Resources Management System server, which got struck by lightning.

The employees' salaries are credited to their bank accounts through the system.

Officials said lightning during Nor'wester (a type of storm which is active during March-April and locally known as Kalbaishakhi) crippled the system's server, which was devised as part of the state's administrative reforms.

Finance minister Sashi Bhusan Behera said: "The server has been repaired and re-started. The employees will get their salaries within two to three days."

Treasury director Bhabani Prasad Nanda said: "The process of clearing the bills has been started. All the bills will be cleared shortly, and the employees, too, will get their salaries."

However, the Opposition blamed the delay in payment of salaries to the state government's poor financial management. "The state's financial administration has collapsed. They are now making all kinds of excuses," said Congress chief whip Tara Prasad Bahinipati.

"According to practice, the employees' salary bills are submitted through Internet by 22nd of every month and later forwarded to the treasury for the release of salaries by 25th. The entire exercise takes eight to 10 days," said a finance department official.

Normally, the sate government employees' salaries are credited to their accounts electronically on the last date of every month. Now, if it falls on a holiday, the next day it is automatically credited to their accounts.

A secretariat employee said: "Delay in salary payment has become a common phenomenon. The government should ask the Human Resources Management System to take precautionary measures, so that such technical snags are avoided." The Class II officer has found it tough to pay his children's tuition fees.

Another employee, under condition of anonymity, confided that he had to take a personal loan to pay the re-admission fees of his children in an English medium school.

"My son and daughter study in Class V in an English medium school in the city. Every year, we have to pay the re-admission fee in April, the amount coming close to Rs 40,000. This time, it was really tough with no salary in hand."