Centre hikes dearness allowance & relief by 3%

Centre hikes dearness allowance & relief by 3%

TIMES NEWS NETWORK

New Delhi:22.10.2021

The Union Cabinet on Thursday approved 3% hike in the dearness allowance (DA) and dearness relief (DR) for central government employees and pensioners “to compensate for price rise”. The hike will benefit around 47.14 lakh central government employees and 68.62 lakh pensioners just ahead of the Diwali when people have additional expenses.

This latest DA instalment to the serving employees and DR to the pensioners will be effective from July 1, 2021, Union information and broadcasting minister, Anurag Thakur said while sharing the details of the Cabinet decision with reporters.

He said after this hike, the allowances will increase to 31% of the basic pay and the decision will have an additional burden of around ₹9,488.7 crore per annum on the exchequer.

Prior to this, the Centre had approved an increase in DA and DR from 17% to 28%.

In view of the Covid-19 pandemic, the government had frozen additional instalments of the DA and DR in 2020 due to a shortfall in revenue collection after the pandemic devastated the economy.

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