Apart from Maharashtra and Haryana, where elections are being held, most Cabinet Ministers will fan out to 120 locations across the country for the launch of the Government’s ₹1,000 minimum pension scheme.

Among the Ministers scheduled to attend the pension awareness functions are Finance Minister Arun Jaitley and Health Minister Harsh Vardhan in Delhi, Commerce Minister Nirmala Sitharaman in Chennai, Home Minister Rajnath Singh in Lucknow, Human Resource Minister Smriti Irani in Ahmedabad and Power Minister Piyush Goyal in Chandigarh, the Labour Ministry said.

As part of the launch, the Employees’ Provident Fund Organisation has also asked its field offices to organise facilitation programmes on September 30, in which some pensioners will also be honoured.

The scheme, which comes into effect from October 1 and has already been notified, will benefit 32 lakh pensioners who have been getting less than ₹1,000/month and 14 lakh getting less than ₹500/month, Labour Minister Narendra Singh Tomar said at a press conference here on Thursday, adding that the total number of pensioners was ₹49 lakh.

The pensioners will be paid this amount for the remaining part of the financial year (October to March), after which the whole process will have to be re-notified.

Blame game

When asked why this arrangement was not made with retrospective effect this fiscal so that retired workers could benefit, Tomar put the ball in the previous UPA Government’s court, blaming it for delaying the notification.

As regards the notification to continue paying the similar amount in the next financial year, the Minister said that decision would be taken later.

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