New Delhi: The Union Cabinet today approved to release an additional instalment of Dearness Allowance (DA) to Central Government employees and Dearness Relief (DR) to pensioners with effect from July 1, 2023.
This represents an increase of 4% over the existing rate of 42% of the Basic Pay/Pension, to compensate for the price rise.
“This increase in the DA and DR is in accordance with the accepted formula, which is based on the recommendations of the 7th Central Pay Commission,” a cabinet note stated.
This will benefit about 48.67 lakh Central Government employees and 67.95 lakh pensioners.
The combined impact on the exchequer on account of both Dearness Allowance and Dearness Relief would be Rs.12,857 crore per annum.
Cabinet approves Productivity Linked Bonus (PLB) of Rs 1968.87 Crores for railway employees
The Union Cabinet today also approved Productivity Linked Bonus (PLB) equivalent to 78 days’ wages for the financial year 2022-23 to all eligible non-gazetted Railway employees namely Track Maintainers, Loco Pilots, Train Managers (Guards), Station Masters, Supervisors, Technicians, Technician Helpers, Pointsman, Ministerial Staff and other Group ‘C’ staff (excluding Railway Protection Force/Railway Protection Special Force personnel).
The Union Government approved payment of PLB of Rs 1968.87 crore to 11,07,346 railway employees in recognition of the performance of Railways in the year 2022-2023 when it loaded a record cargo of 1509 million tonnes and carried nearly 6.5 billion passengers.
“Many factors contributed to this record performance. These include improvement in infrastructure due to infusion of record Capex by the Government in Railways, efficiency in operations and better technology among other things,” a Cabinet note stated.
– global bihari bureau
