7th Pay Commission Latest News Update: With the hike in Dearness Allowance (DA) and Dearness Relief (DR), the central government employees are likely to get a double bonus this week, reports claimed. For the unversed, the Narendra Modi-led Centre had earlier increased the Dearness Allowance (DA) for its lakhs of employees to 28 per cent from 17 per cent, with effect from July 1. Later, the House Rent Allowance (HRA) of the government employees was also hiked with effect from August 2021.
While issuing the order, the central government had said that the house rent allowance and DA should be increased on the basis of the basic salary of government employees. As per the rules, the HRA would be raised by 3 per cent, when DA crosses 25 per cent of the employee’s basic pay. In 2017, the Department of Expenditure had issued an order wherein it had said that when the dearness allowance will exceed 25%, the HRA will be revised automatically.
Though nothing has been confirmed as yet, a media report claimed that HRA as per the revised rates will be paid along with the salary of this month.
All You Need to Know About the HRA hike
The Central Government employees get the hike as per the categories of the cities they live in. For those residing in ‘X’ category cities, the hike will be 27 per cent. For residents of ‘Y’ and ‘Z’ categories, the hike will be 18 per cent and 9 per cent respectively.
The X category cities are those with a population of more than 50 lakh. The Y and Z category cities are those with populations more than 5 lakh and less than five lakh respectively.
How Much Your Salary Will Increase
The monthly salary of a government employee at entry-level (Level 1) ranges from Rs Rs 18,000 to Rs 56,900, which means that a government employee’s basic salary is Rs 18,000. At the 17 per cent DA rate, these employees were getting Rs 3060 as the dearness allowance till June 2021. However, from July 2021 (after the DA hike) these employees are getting Rs 5040 per month. On this basis, the monthly salary of central employees increased by Rs 1980.
