EPFO notifies minimum Rs 1000 pension for 32 lakh beneficiaries

NEW DELHI: In a move that would benefit about 32 lakh pensioners, the government has notified the amendment on Employees Pension Scheme run by Employees’ Provident Fund Organisation (EPFO) to provide a minimum monthly pension of Rs 1,000 starting from October.

Moreover, the decision to increase the wage ceiling will also result in higher benefit under the Employee’s Deposit Linked Insurance (EDLI) from a maximum of Rs 1.30 lakh to a maximum of Rs 3.60 lakh.

All employees to whom the Employees Provident Fund and Miscellaneous Provision Act applies, have a ‘statutory liability’ to subscribe to EDLI to provide for the benefit of life insurance to all their employees. Earlier, estimates of EPFO had suggested that the immediate beneficiaries who were getting pension of less than Rs 1,000 every month would be 28 lakh while the total number of pensionersunder EPFO’s Employees’ Pension Scheme was 44 lakh.

Labour and employment minister Narendra Singh Tomar on Thursday said that the long-pending demand for increase in the pension will soon see the light of day. At present, a large number of pensioners are getting only paltry amounts as pension under the scheme. Nearly two-thirds of the pensioners are in receipt of pension of less than 1000 rupees.

Tomar said that the scheme will be launched by Central ministers on September 31.