According to media reports, the Employees’ Provident Fund Organisation (EPFO) is planning to increase the minimum monthly pension to Rs. 9,000 for its subscribers in the coming days.
Regarding this, a meeting of the Ministry of Labour and Employment is scheduled to be held in February 2022 where a decision to this effect will take place.
According to reports, the government is working on this under Employees Pension Scheme or EPS wherein the minimum monthly pension can be increased from Rs 1,000 to Rs 9,000.
The pensioners are demanding this for long and many rounds of discussions have already taken place to meet this agenda.
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The decision on this will be taken keeping in mind the recommendations of the Standing Committee of Parliament.
During the meeting in Feb 2022, two important points are likely to be discussed that include implementation of the New-Wage Code and minimum pension under the Employees’ Pension Scheme.
In March 2021, the Standing Committee of Parliament had recommended increasing the minimum pension amount from Rs 1,000 to Rs 3,000.
However, the demand of pensioners is that the pension amount should be increased to at least Rs 9,000. Only then will the EPS-95 pensioner get the benefit in the true sense.
One suggestion says that the pension should be fixed according to the last drawn salary of the employee just before the retirement.
This suggestion will also be considered in the Labour Ministry meeting.
The Employee’s Pension Scheme (EPS) was introduced in the year 1995 with the main aim of helping employees in the organised sector. All employees who are eligible for the Employees Provident Fund (EPF) scheme will also be eligible for EPS. The eligibility criteria to avail the EPS benefits are mentioned below:
- You must be a member of the EPFO.
- You must have attained the age of 50 years for early pension and 58 years for regular pension.
- In case you defer the pension for 2 years (until you reach the age of 60 years), you will be eligible to receive the pension at an additional rate of 4% per year.
- You must have completed at least 10 years of service.
