Kolkata: The central government has lit up Diwali festivities for its employees by announcing a 3% hike in Dearness Allowance (DA). As a result, DA now stands at 58% for the Central government employees. The measure will benefit 1.18 crore employees and pensioners — 49.19 lakh central government employees and 68.72 lakh pensioners.

The Union Cabinet gave its nod to the proposal to hike DA on Wednesday. The additional money will be paid with effect from July 1 and employees and pensioners will get arrears. In the last week of September the cabinet had given its green light to a performance-linked bonus for railway employees. The bonus was for 78 days and government said it will spend Rs 1865.68 crore to distribute the bonus to 10,91,146 non-gazetted railway employees.

DA hike can stoke c

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