The long awaited proposal for ensuring a minimum pension of Rs 1,000 per month for the member, family and disabled pensioners under the Employees’ Pension Scheme, 1995 along with commensurate increase in the children and orphan pensions has been notified by the Union Government on August 19, 2014, said M. Venkaiah Naidu, Union Minister for Urban Development, Housing & Urban Poverty Alleviation and Parliamentary Affairs.
Speaking at the launch of EPS Pensioner facilitation program at Ravindra Bharati here on Tuesday, Venkaiah Naidu said Narendra Modi government launched yet another welfare measure for the working class by raising minimum pension to Rs.1000. He launched PM’s Jan Dhan Yojana a month back, he reminded. Stating that Narendra Modi is the Messiah of the poor and God’s gift to Indian people, Venkaiah said within 100 days the PM brought India to the centre stage of International fora. “He made India as first Chairman of BRICS Bank for five years. See the amazing recognition and response in USA. No doubt he will emerge as one of the key leaders of the world in due course of time. We believe in cooperative federalism. We should work as Team India. Development and good governance are our agenda”, he added.
The Union minister said the Employees Provident Fund Organization was running the Employees Family Pension Scheme, 1971 under which a pension was given to the family of the employee in the event of death while in service. There was no provision for pension to employees on superannuation or retirement under this scheme, but later the Employees’ Pension Scheme, 1995 came into effect from November 16, 1995, he said, adding the scheme is funded by means of diversion of 8.33% of the wages of members from the employer’s contribution and 1.16% of the wage is also contributed by the Union Government. The scheme provided a wide variety of pension under different contingencies and had provisions for pension to employees on superannuation, retirement, disablement, death, etc.
The Union minister said pensioners under the EPS were getting low monthly pension amounts as the amount of member’s pension is directly proportional to Pensionable Service and Pensionable Salary. If one or both of the factors are low then the pension amount shall be low. A large number of pensioners have rendered their services under the erstwhile Employees’ Family Pension Scheme, 1971 and were migrated to the new scheme, he added. The amendment to the new scheme provides Minimum Pension of Rs 1000 per month to member and widow(er)/Nominee/Dependent Parent; Children pension of Rs 250 per month per child (subject to maximum to two children at a time); Orphan Pension of Rs 750 per month per orphan (subject to maximum to two orphan at a time). The enhancement in the monthly pension amount which comes after almost a decade and a half when the monthly pension amount had remained static under EPS would bring relief to a large proportion of the EPS pensioners.
Venkaiah said although the EPS Fund continues to have an actuarial deficit of Rs. 11,000 crores the proposal for ensuring minimum pension of Rs. 1,000/- could become possible only because of the budgetary support committed by the Central Government to the extent of giving cover for the top-up amount between the calculated pension and the assured minimum pension. The EPS presently has 49 lakh pensioners and the enhanced minimum pension would benefit approximately 32 lakh pensioners who were drawing pension less than Rs. 10001- p.m, 13 lakh pensioners are presently getting pension at less than Rs.500 per month while 19 lakh are getting pension between Rs. 500 to Rs. 1000 per month. The wage ceiling for contribution under EPF, EPS and EDLI has been increased from Rs. 6,500 per month to Rs 15,000 per month. The increased wage ceiling means that the monthly pension benefits will also increase from Rs. 3,250/- to Rs. 7,500/- per month. The Increase in the wage ceiling will also increase 1.16 % Union Government contribution by approximately Rs. 2500 crore to Rs. 3000 crore. The increase in wage ceiling is expected to bring 50 lakh new employees under social security umbrella, he added. He also said the Maximum benefit under EDLI has also increased from earlier Rs 1,30,000 to Rs.3,60,000 almost three fold.
The Union minister said several new initiatives that EPFO has adopted include Online Transfer Claim Portal (OTCP) – has enabled online submission of account transfer claims and made the entire process transparent and cut the time frame from several months to a few days. Online registration of establishments (OLRE) – has made it possible for businesses and employers to register themselves and obtain the code number online. The process is transparent and quick. Members passbook (E-passbook) – Provides complete and up to date online access to accounts statements to members. E-payment of benefits – all payments of claims and pensions are made to the members and beneficiaries bank account electronically using NEFT and CBS. Universal Accounts Number (UAN)- this initiative allows members to have complete portability of their accounts and service across employment and geography as far as EPF is concerned. The hassle of separate identity numbers for each employment and their transfer and merging is removed for the member. He also said EPFO has already allocated 4.17 crores UAN numbers to the various employees. As part of its data updating drive the organization has presently captured the data and even the bank account in respect of two crore employees have already been captured. (NSS)
