7th pay commission: Decision on DA, DR arrears to be taken today

The Centre is scheduled to hold a meeting on Saturday to deliberate upon the pending dearness allowance arrears of millions of central government employees and pensioners, who are awaiting a hike in their salary. The stalled dearness allowance (DA) and dearness relief (DR) of central government employees and pensioners will be resumed from July 1, the government said.

Officials from the Union ministry of finance, the National Council of Joint Consultative Machinery (JCM) and the department of personnel and training (DoPT) will make the final decision on the DA arrears on Saturday's meeting, under the recommendation of the 7th Pay Commission. The Cabinet Secretary of India will preside over the meeting.

Shiva Gopal Mishra, JCM's Secretary (Staff Side) said, "Official meeting between the officials of the Department of Expenditure at the Ministry of Finance, Department of Personnel & Training (DoPT) and the representatives of JCM is going to take place on 26th June. The scheduled meeting will be chaired by the Cabinet Secretary of India."

He further added, "The meeting will revolve around the 7th CPC DA and 7th CPC DR benefits of the central government employees and central government pensioners. In this meeting we will discuss about the DA arrears and DR arrears payment due for 1.1.2020, 1.7.2020 and 1.1.2021 to the central government servants and central government pensioners respectively."

Any increase in DA from July 1, however, will only be effective from that day and employees would not get any arrears on non-revision of DA for the previous period.

The three instalments of DA for the central government employees and DR for pensioners, due on January 1, 2020, July 1, 2020, and January 1, 2021, were stalled due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

(Edited by Rupashree Ravi)

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