In an attempt to increase the take-home pay for working women in India, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley proposed that the first-time women employees will have to contribute only 8 percent of their income under the Employee Provident Fund for the first three years, instead of the earlier 12 percent or 10 percent, the Economic Times reported.
The government also announced that it would contribute 12 percent of the wages to new employees under the Employees Provident Fund Organisation (EPFO).
The announcement was made by Finance Minister Arun Jaitley while presenting the Budget 2018-19, which is the last one being tabled by the current government in Parliament before the general elections due in the first half of 2019.
Government has decided to contribute 12 percent of wages to new employees across all sectors in EPF.Arun Jaitley, Finance Minister
With the existing contribution of 1.16 percent towards EPFO subscribers' basic wages, the government bears an annual burden of around Rs 6,750 crore.
The current 8.65 interest rate on EPF deposits was lowered during the last fiscal year from the previous 8.8 percent prevailing in 2015-16.
Under the EPF scheme, an employee has to contribute a certain sum towards the scheme and an equal contribution is paid by the employer. The employee gets a lumpsum amount at the time of maturity, including self and employer's contribution with interest on both.
(With inputs from IANS and Economic Times)
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