Government approves three percent DA increase for Central government employees

New Delhi: The Union Cabinet on Thursday hiked dearness allowance and dearness relief by 3 percent to 31 percent.The move will benefit 47.14 lakh central government employees and 68.62 lakh pensioners, said Minister of Information & Broadcasting Anurag Singh Thakur.The decision to hike the allowance will put an annual burden of Rs 9,488 crore on the exchequer.Earlier in July, the government had restored the dearness allowance (DA) and dearness relief (DR) and increased the rate of allowance from 17 percent to 28 percent.In view of the COVID-19 pandemic, the government had frozen the three additional instalments of the DA and DR, which were due from 1 January, 2020, 1 July, 2020, and 1 January, 2021.