The West Bengal government has increased the dearness allowance for the state employees by 3%. This announcement has come a few days after protests by state government officials over the demand for pending dearness allowance.
Earlier this week, the issue reached the Lok Sabha as well, where BJP and TMC MPs clashed over the payment of pending dearness allowance. Minister of State for Finance (Independent Charge) Chandrima Bhattacharya has presented the state budget 2023-24 in the assembly on Wednesday. West Bengal government has increased DA by 3% for government employees. The Finance Minister has presented a budget of Rs 3.39 lakh crore for 2023-24.
Presenting the budget, said that in the financial year 2022-23, the SGDP of Bengal is estimated to grow at the rate of 8.4 percent, the industry at 7.8 percent. Chandrima Bhattacharya said that IT, Internet of Things and Artificial Intelligence sectors have attracted significant investment. 1.88 crore women will be included in the Laxmi Bhandar project. Finance Minister Chandrima Bhattacharya says that after crossing the age of 60, they will get old age allowance.
Central government employees may get good news
Central government may increase dearness allowance (DA) by four percentage points from existing 38 percent to 42 percent for its more than one crore employees and pensioners. A formula has been agreed upon for this purpose. Dearness Allowance for employees and pensioners is calculated on the basis of the Consumer Price Index for Industrial Workers (CPI-IW) released by the Labor Bureau every month.
Shiv Gopal Mishra, general secretary of the All India Railwaymen’s Federation, had said that the CPI-IW for December 2022 was released on January 31, 2023. The increase in dearness allowance works out to 4.23 percent. But the government does not take decimals into DA. In such a situation, there can be an increase of four percentage points in DA. It can be increased from 38 percent to 42 percent.
