Around 75,000 employees of the Eastern Railway are under the New Pension Scheme (NPS) and would now have the option to switch over to the newly announced Unified Pension Scheme (UPS) by the centre.

Around 23 lakh central government employees are anticipated to get benefitted from the UPS approved by the Cabinet on 24 August. The scheme includes ‘Assured Pension’ of 50 per cent of the average basic pay drawn over the last 12 months prior to superannuation for a minimum qualifying service of 25 years and proportionate for lesser service period up to a minimum of 10 years of service. It also offers ‘Assured Family Pension’ of 60 per cent of pension of the employee immediately before her/his demise along with ‘Assured Minimum Pension of Rs 10,000 per month on superannuation after minimum 10 years of service and so on.

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According to a senior official of the finance department of the Eastern Railway, around 75,000 employees of the Eastern Railway could also reap the benefits of the UPS if they opt for the scheme. The figure of 75,000 includes 1,100 pensioners in the zonal railway.

In the Sealdah division alone, there are more than around 23,000 employees of which about 16.5 thousand are under the NPS scheme, which is about 71 per cent of the total,” according to the divisional railway manager, Dipak Nigam. “The new facility would be an option for the employees to switch over to the UPS from NPS,” said Mr Nigam. “Some of the highlights of the UPS include assured pension, assured family pension, assured minimum pension and indexation of the assured pensions,” pointed out the DRM.

As reiterated by the senior official of the finance department of the ER, an interesting feature of the UPS is that the concern of the employees over the risk factors have been assured by the central government in the scheme which is to be effective from 1 April, 2025.