Assam to Hike DA by 10% for State Govt Staff

Guwahati : Following the decision to hike dearness allowance (DA) by 10 per cent for central government employees, the Assam government today said it will also increase it to 90 per cent from existing 80 per cent for its staff. “We will also hike the DA as soon as the Centre notifies it for its employees. We have been giving this benefit to our people at par with the Central government employees,” Assam government’s Additional Chief Secretary (Finance), Himangshu Sekhar Das said here. Yesterday, the central government approved a proposal to hike DA to 90 per cent from existing 80 per cent, a move that would benefit about 50 lakh employees and 30 lakh pensioners.

“I think, the Centre will notify the hike in the next 10-15 days. We will take the decision accordingly,” Das said. This is a double digit hike in DA after about three years. It was last in September 2010 that the government had announced a hike of 10 per cent to be given with effect from July 1, 2010. DA was hiked to 80 per cent from 72 per cent in April this year effective from January 1, 2013. As per practice, the government uses CPI-IW data for the past 12 months to arrive at a number for the purpose of any DA hike. The retail inflation for industrial workers between July 2012 and June 2013 was used to compute the increase in DA.