8 Big Announcements - Nirmala Sitharaman

Nirmala Sithara

8 Big Announcements - Nirmala Sitharaman

Finance Minister announced 8 big announcements made for people facing difficulties due to this Lock-down, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman today announced a relief package. Major impact in EPF of Employee and Employer.

For organised sector workers

• Government of India will pay the EPF contribution - both for employer (12%) and employee (12%) - for the next three months so that nobody suffers due to loss of continuity in the EPFO contribution. 
• This is for all those establishment who have upto 100 employees, and 90% of who draw Rs 15,000 salary per month. 
• The second announcement will benefit 80 lakh employee - the EPFO scheme’s regulations will be amended to allow non-refundable advance of 75% of the amount standing to the credit of the member (for contingency expenditure), or three-month wages, whichever is lower. This will benefit 4.8 crore workers.

For Construction Workers

• Welfare fund for construction workers.
• State governments to utilize Rs 31,000 crore in that fund to and protect these workers against any economic disruption. This will benefit 3.5 crore workers.

For farmers

• 8.69 crore farmers will be benefited through the announcement of direct cash transfers.
• Installment of Rs 2000 will be transferred in their account in the first week of April

For MGNREGA (Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act) workers:

• The government today increased wages under the scheme by Rs 2000 per worker on average as additional income. This will benefit five crore families.

For poor widows/pensioners/divyang: 

• One-time ex-gratia additional support of Rs 1000 announced. 
• This will be given through direct benefit transfer (DBT) in two installments in three months. 
• This will benefit three crore widows, pensioners and divyang.

For women Jan Dhan account holders: 

• A support of Rs 500 per month for the next three month, so that these women are able to run their household in this hour of crisis. 
• This will benefit 20 crore such women. 
• The money will be transferred through DBT.

For those covered under the Ujjwala scheme: 

• The nearly 8.3 crore BPL families, who were benefited by the scheme, will be provided three cylinders for the next three months.

For women self-help group (SHGs)

• There are 63 lakh SHGs which benefit seven crore households in the country. 
• The finance minister today announced doubling of collateral-free loans (from Rs 10 lakh to Rs 20 lakh) for the SHGs.