EPFO starts crediting interest for FY20

Labour Minister Santosh Kumar Gangwar on Thursday announced that the Employees Provident Fund interest for FY 2019-20 to over 6 crore subscribers is being credited to their accounts.

Meanwhile, the Labour Ministry has issued guidelines for implementation of Aatmanirbhar Bharat Rojgar Yojana, the scheme intends to support job creation through providing EPFO contribution.

“We have issued a notification to provide 8.5 per cent rate of interest on EPF for 2019-20. We have also begun the process to credit the said rate of interest into subscribers account,” he said.

The process for capital gains for payment of 0.35 per cent interest for 2019-20 has also been completed, he added. “It (8.5 per cent interest) would comprise 8.15 per cent from debt income and balance 0.35 per cent (capital gain) from the sale of ETFs (exchange traded funds) subject to their redemption by 31st December, 2020,” he said.

New guidelines

For implementation of Aatmanirbhar Bharat Rozgar Yojana, the Labour Ministry said in the guidelines that new establishments getting registered between October 1, 2020 and June 30, 2021 under EPFO will also be eligible. For these establishments, reference base of employees will be zero. For existing establishment, if it has up to 50 employees as on September 30, it will have to give new job to at least two persons between October 1 and June 30, 2021 to get the benefit of the scheme. If the number of employees is more than 50, then the minimum addition should be five. The Central Government will provide subsidy for two years in respect of the new eligible employees.

The scheme has defined a beneficiary as any new employee joining employment in EPFO-registered establishments on monthly wages less than ₹15,000. EPF members drawing monthly wage of less than ₹15,000 who made an exit from employment during the Covid-19 pandemic from March 1 to September 30 and employed on or after October 1, will also be eligible.

For establishments employing up to 1,000, the government will bear the total of 24 per cent (employee’s contribution of 12 and employer’s contribution of 12 per cent). In case of establishments employing more than 1,000 employees, the government will pay only the employee’s EPF contribution of 12 per cent. In both cases, enterprises need to be registered under EPFO and the employee should have Aadhaar-seeded account.

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