7th Pay Commission: Centre likely to hike HRA of central govt employees, after DA; check details
7th Pay Commission: PM Narendra Modi-led NDA government is likely to bring good news for central government employees. According to reports, the central government servants are expected to get a hike in HRA (Housing Rent Allowance) as Centre has ended the confusion related to HRA issued to the government employees.
The Central Government has issued a circular to all the departments stating special exemption given to employees from a particular city will be continued, according to reports. This development comes after it was reported that central govt employees are expected to get a hike in their DA by the end of July 2019.
According to the report in Zee Business, if in case any city has had an upgradation on the basis of population, the HRA of employees from such city will be hiked.
Zee Business quoted Harishankar Tiwari, Former Secretary and Assistant Secretary of All India Audit and Accounts Association saying, "the Central Government has revised the HRA after implementing 7th Pay commission."
There are 3 categories - X, Y and Z for this;
X Category: It includes cities with a population of more than 50 lakh and employees living here are getting a maximum of 24% HRA per month.
Y Category: The government servants living here are getting a maximum of16 per cent
Z Category: The government servants living here are getting a maximum of 8% HRA.
According to the circular issued by the Finance Ministry, if the city has upgraded on the basis of its population, the HRA of the government employee living here will be increased.
"If a city's population is more than 5 lakh, such city will become into Y category from the Z category and will start seeing 16% HRA instead of 8%," Zee Business quoted Harishankar Tiwari, Former Secretary and Assistant Secretary of All India Audit and Accounts Association, as saying.
On the basis of the census 2011, the categories of cities for HRA have been decided. However, the centre also upgrades the cities based on the report of their agencies.
Earlier, it was reported that the Dearness Allowance (DA) of the govt employees might get increased by 5 per cent by the end of July 2019. However, it is also being said that the government did not make any announcement taking only this into account.
But as the CPI statistic for June 2019 is still awaited, the update is uncertain. If the government decides to hike the DA, it would be at 17 per cent -- the highest corresponding increment since 2016.
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