Thursday, 10 March 2022 | PNS | Dehradun
The hopes of more than 80,000 employees of Uttarakhand government for Old Pension Scheme (OPS) soared on Thursday with the Chhattisgarh government announcing restoration of OPS for its employees covered under New Pension Scheme (NPS). Incidentally Chhattisgarh is the second Congress ruled state after Rajasthan that has announced OPS for its employees.
The state president of National Movement for Old Pension Scheme (NMOPS) Jeetmani Painuly told The Pioneer that the agitation of the employees has started yielding results. He said the employees of Uttarakhand express their gratitude towards the Chief Minister of Chhattisgarh Bhupesh Baghel for his decision of restoring OPS. He also congratulated the national president of NMOPS Vijay Kumar Bandhu for the victory of the employees.
He said that the pension is a state subject so the Uttarakhand government should declare the restoration of OPS for the employees appointed after October 1, 2005. The president of Uttarakhand unit of NMOPS said that the employees are committed to take their struggle for restoration of OPS to desired end. The NPS was started in the year 2004 by the Manmohan Singh government to reduce the ever increasing burden of pension on state exchequer. Under it a portion of the salary of the employees is deducted every month and the government makes an equal contribution and a retirement corpus is built. The employees receive a pension from this corpus. The employees are finding the NPS non lucrative and are demanding the restoration of OPS in which the retiring employee gets 50 per cent of his last drawn salary as pension.
