Govt hikes DA by 3 percent for central employees

New Delhi, Oct 21: The Union Cabinet on Thursday hiked dearness allowance and dearness relief by 3 percent to 31 percent to benefit 47.14 lakh central government employees and 68.62 lakh pensioners.

This was informed by Minister of Information & Broadcasting Anurag Singh Thakur. This decision to hike the allowance will put an annual burden of Rs 9,488 crore on the exchequer. Earlier in July, the government had restored the dearness allowance (DA) and dearness relief (DR) and increased the rate of allowance from 17 percent to 28 percent.

In view of the COVID-19 pandemic, the Union Government had frozen the three additional instalments of the DA and DR, which were due from January 1, 2020, July 1, 2020, and January 1, 2021.