Centre to hike DA by 2 pc from Jan 1

New Delhi, Mar 5

It will be Holi gift to many Central government employees. The Centre is likely to hike the dearness allowance by 2 per cent to 4 per cent for its about 50 lakh employees and 58 lakh pensioners.

Dearness allowance and dearness relief are provided to employees and pensioners to neutralise the impact of inflation on their earnings.

The average consumer price index for industrial workers (CPI-IW) to be taken into account for raising DA is 4.95 per cent from January 1 to December 31, 2017. Since the government has already hiked the dearness allowance by 2 per cent in October last year from July 1, 2016, it will now raise it further by 2 per cent.

As per an agreed upon formula, the Centre hikes the allowance taking 12-month average of retail inflation. The government does not consider the price rise rate beyond a decimal point for deciding the rate of the dearness allowance.