Old-age pension for retd staff of PSUs, boards & corporations

Pradeep Sharma

Chandigarh, March 4

Thousands of retired employees of public sector undertakings (PSUs), boards and corporations in the state are set to get the old-age pension.

Scheme amended

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It has been decided to amend the Old Age Samman Allowance Scheme to provide the benefit to such pensioners so that the sum total of the old-age pension and the employees’ provident fund pension is equal to the old-age pension of Rs 3,000 per month. — Manohar Lal Khattar, CM

Over nine years after the old-age pension was discontinued by the state government in 2015, Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar announced that the ex-employees would get the same in his Budget speech recently. However, the total amount of the old-age pension and employees’ provident fund (EPF) pension of these employees would be capped to Rs 3,000 per month, sources said.

“It has been decided to amend the Old Age Samman Allowance Scheme to provide the benefit to such pensioners so that the sum total of the old-age pension and the EPF pension is equal to the old-age pension of Rs 3,000 per month,” Khattar had said in his speech.

Currently, the senior citizens, who are receiving the EPF pension, are excluded from the benefit of the old-age pension scheme, even if their EPF pension was less than Rs 3,000.

The 2015 notification, which debarred the EPF pensioners, thousands of whom were the employees of the HMT (Pinjore), boards and corporations under the Haryana Government, had led to a feeling of resentment among the former employees.

Vijay Bansal, president of Shivalik Vikas Manch — a social organization — said most of these employees were currently getting the EPF pension in the range of Rs 1,500 to Rs 2,000. “The amendment in the old-age pension scheme, entitling them to a maximum pension of Rs 3,000, will go a long way in mitigating financial difficulties of these employees to a certain extent,” said Bansal.