India’s central government staff may see hike in salaries

The 3-percentage-point increase in DA to 34% will benefit more than 10 million central employees and pensioners. The government is expected to transfer the money for the higher DA boost and arrears from the previous two months along with the March salary.

After the 3-percentage-point increase in allowance, a central government employee with a basic pay of Rs18,000 (US$235) will receive Rs73,440 (US$959) per year in DA.

The DA is a component of government employees’ and pensioners’ wages. To keep up with rising inflation, the federal government typically revises DA and dearness relief (DR) benefits twice a year, in January and July, though the revisions were disrupted by the pandemic for some months. Employees are paid differently depending on whether they work in the urban, semi-urban, or rural sectors.

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The last time the government raised DA and DR was in October last year. That increase benefited 4.8 million central government employees and 6.5 million retirees across India. The current DA rate is 31%, following the 3-percentage-point increase last October and an 11-percentage-point hike in July, according to Zee News.