EPFO received highest ever total contribution of over Rs 64,800 cr during 2022-23: Labour Ministry

economictimes.indiatimes.com:

Employees’ Provident Fund Organisation received a total contribution of Rs 64885.60 crore during 2022-23, the highest ever under its Employees’ Pension Scheme, shows the labour ministry’s response to a question in Rajya Sabha on Thursday. This has taken the EPS total corpus to Rs 7,80,308.93 crore in the last fiscal year compared to the total corpus of Rs 6,89,210.20 crore in the preceding financial year.

This also includes the interest earned on the investments made by the EPFO from the EPS contribution. Even the number of pensioners under the scheme were the highest at 7.55 million as against 7.27 million in 2021-22 while the pension disbursed under the scheme in the last financial year stood at Rs 14,444.60 crore as against Rs 12,933.12 crore pension disbursed in 2021-22.

As per the response, while the employers’ contribution in 2022-23 stood at Rs 56,170.84 crore, the contribution of the central government was pegged at Rs 8,714.76 crore. The EPS, 1995 is a ‘defined contribution-defined benefit’ social security scheme.

Under this scheme, the employer contributes 8.33% of the wages of the employee while the central government contributes 1.16% of the wages capped at Rs 15,000 per month. The Government had, for the first time, provided a minimum pension of Rs 1000 per month to the pensioners under Employees’ Pension Scheme (EPS), 1995 from September 1, 2014 by providing additional budgetary support.Rs 9663 cr disbursed under ABRY In a separate response, Rameswar Teli, minister of state for labour and employment said the government has disbursed Rs 9663.82 crore till July 22, 2023 under the Aatmanirbhar Bharat Rojgar Yojana (ABRY) since the launch of the scheme in October 2020.