The Pension Fund Regulatory & Development Authority (PFRDA) on Thursday notified operationalisation of the Unified Pension Scheme (UPS) which promises an assured pension of 50 per cent of the average basic pay drawn over the last 12 months prior to superannuation.
This follows the UPS notification dated January 24, 2025 by the government for central government employees covered under the National Pension System (NPS). The regulations shall come into effect from April 1, 2025, PFRDA said in a statement.
These regulations enable the enrolment of central government employees including an existing central government employee in service as on April 1, 2025, who is covered under NPS and new recruit in the central government services, who joins service on or after April, 2025.
The enrolment and claim forms for all these categories of central government employees will be available online from April 1, 2025 on the website of Protean CRA – https://npscra.nsdl.co.in The employees also have the option to submit the forms physically, it said.
UPS or assured payout would not be available in case of removal or dismissal from service or resignation of the employee, as per the notification. The notification added that the rate of full assured payout will be 50 per cent of 12 monthly average basic pay, immediately prior to superannuation subject to a minimum qualifying service of 25 years against a market returns linked payout under the NPS.
The notification will give the option to 23 lakh government employees to choose between UPS and NPS, which came into effect on January 1, 2004. The Union Cabinet, chaired by Prime Minister Narendra Modi on August 24, 2024, approved the UPS.
Under the old pension scheme (OPS), effective before January 2004, employees got 50 per cent of their last drawn basic pay as pension. Unlike the old pension scheme, UPS is contributory in nature, wherein employees will be required to contribute 10 per cent of their basic salary and dearness allowance while the employer’s contribution (the central government) will be 18.5 per cent. However, the eventual payout depends on the market returns on that corpus, mostly invested in government debt.
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