EPFO Pension News: Under the Employees’ Provident Fund Organization’s pension scheme, it is too little to give Rs 1,000 as minimum monthly pension to the subscribers. The Labor Ministry should take forward the proposal to increase the pension amount.
EPFO Pension Portal: A committee of Parliament on Tuesday said that giving Rs 1,000 as minimum monthly pension to the subscribers under the Pension Scheme of Employees’ Provident Fund Organization (EPFO) is too low. In such a situation, it is necessary that the Ministry of Labor takes forward the proposal to increase the pension amount. Parliament’s Standing Committee on Labor in its report tabled in Parliament on Demands for Grants 2022-23 said, “The monthly pension of Rs 1,000 fixed eight years ago is now too low.”
Measures to be taken to increase pension
According to the Parliamentary Committee, it is necessary for the Ministry of Labor and Employment to take forward the matter with adequate budgetary support from the Finance Ministry as per the recommendation of the high-powered monitoring committee. Apart from this, EPFO should evaluate all its pension schemes through experts so that the monthly member pension can be increased to the appropriate extent.
Pension to be done 2000
The Ministry of Labor had constituted a high-powered monitoring committee in the year 2018 to evaluate and review the Employees’ Pension Scheme, 1995. The committee had also recommended in its report that the minimum monthly pension for members/widow/widow pensioners should be increased to Rs.2,000. Necessary annual budgetary provisions should be made for this. However, the Finance Ministry did not agree to increase the minimum monthly pension from Rs 1,000.
Discussion with many committees
According to the parliamentary committee, many committees have discussed this in detail. From this the same conclusion comes that unless there is a proper assessment of surplus/deficit of EPFO’s pension scheme from experts, review of monthly pension cannot be done. The report also said that EPFO members, especially those who retired before 2015, are facing difficulties for ‘e-nomination’. Along with this, difficulties are also being faced in the functioning of ‘Online Transfer Claim Portal’ (OTCP).
Appreciation of EPFO’s efforts The
Parliamentary Committee appreciated the efforts of EPFO for greater use of information technology tools along with Digital India initiative. Along with this, it was suggested that the Employees’ Provident Fund Organization should make more efforts for reforms to overcome the problems related to ‘nomination’ electronically.
