Ahead of Durga Puja, the Chief Minister on Friday announced an increase of 11 per cent in Dearness Allowance (DA) of state government employees and pensioners from July 2021. Along with this, the DA of employees and pensioners has been increased from 17 per cent to 28 per cent. The Chief Minister’s Office (CMO) said in a statement that the increased DA will be credited in the October salary.
The arrears to government employees and pensioners from July 1, 2021 will be given in cash this month. This move will benefit more than 4 lakh employees and 3.5 lakh pensioners. This gift has been given by Odisha Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik to the employees of his state.
The Odisha government has also amended the Group Insurance Scheme (GIS) for all its employees. GIS charges have been increased from Rs 7,500 to Rs 20,000 for employees with grade pay up to Rs 4800.
Similarly, GIS fee has been increased from Rs 12,000 to Rs 30,000 for employees with grade pay of Rs 5,400 or more. The CMO said that the increased GIS fee will be deducted from the salary of the employees in 10 installments as before. The financial assistance given to the family members in the event of the death of the employees has also been increased. Now, this amount has been increased to Rs 4 lakh for employees with grade pay up to Rs 4,800 and Rs 6 lakh for employees of Rs 5,400 or more. Similarly, the amount of funeral allowance has been increased from Rs 5,000 to Rs 10,000 for all employees.