Thursday, 28 September 2017

100% AADHAAR LINKING OF GPF, PPF & EPF BY DEC, 2017 AND USING AADHAAR FOR PORTABILITY: DECISION OF CABINET SECRETARIAT MEETING

No. D-11011/36/2016- DBT (Cab.)

Govt. of India

Cabinet Secretariat

DBT Mission

Subject: Aadhaar linking and interoperability of General Provident Fund (GPF), Public Provident Fund (PPF) and Employees’ Provident Fund (EFF) accounts regarding.

A meeting was held under the chairmanship of Joint Secretary, DBT Mission, Cabinet Secretariat on 25th August, 2017 at 11:00 A.M in the Conference Hall, 4th floor, Shjvaji Stadium Annexe Building, Rajiv Chowk, New Delhi on the subject mentioned above. The list of participants isplaced at Annexure I.

2. Joint Secretary, DBT Mission welcomed the participants and stated that the objective of the meeting is to deliberate on Aadhaar linking of GPF, PPF and EPF accounts of employees, examine the possibility of a centralised repository of employees" fund details with Aadhaar as the primary identifier and establishing portability of fund accounts across organisations. He requested all stakeholders to share comments and suggestions in this regard.

3. Deputy CGA, Govt. Banking Arrangements, D/o Expenditure informed that an on-line salary application system, Employee Information System (EIS) is being developed within PF MS for implementation in all Drawing and Disbursing Offices (DDOS) and Pay Accounts Offices (PAOS) of Central Ministries. EIS is envisaged to be a central repository of details of all salaried employees, and it can also maintain details of GPF of government employees. He fiirther stated that at present, Aadhaar number is not a mandatory field in employee information records, due to which Aadhaar seeding may be low. it was discussed that if the employee data on E13 are linked with Aad’naar, it may serve the purpose of establishing interoperability of salary and GPF accounts across DDOs. It was highlighted that Railways and Defence departments are not covered under £18. An example of e-Samarth was cited, which is a centralised database of CRPP (Central Reserve Police Force) in MHA, which may be studied for this purpose. Dy CGA also mentioned that M/o Railways and Defence may also be consulted in this context.

4. Senior Audit Officer, Office of Comptroller & Auditor General (CAG) of India, Delhi stated that at present, State AG (Auditor General) offices assign new GPF numbers to employees while moving across different FAQs and there is no centralized mapping system with Aadhaar as the primary identifier. JS. DBT Mission requested that the matter may be taken up with the Office of C&AG, with the concerned Dy C&AG to examine the possibility of mapping all State GPF subscribers across the country. It was suggested that the role of a third party such as NSDL to create and maintain this database may also be examined.

5. Assistant Director, D/o Posts stated that that presently, around 25 lakh PPF accounts out of 27.2 lakh accounts are on Core Banking Solution (CBS) network and these accounts are portable across Post Offices. It was informed that every PPF account is associated with a PPF number and a Customer Identification Form (CIF) number, which is a unique number that holds all personal as well as account related information of the customer. ideally, a customer can have one CIF number in one post office. though the customer can have multiple accounts under these numbers. It was further informed that Aadhaar linking with individual accounts and CIF numbers is being undertaken and 4.7 crore ClFs out of total 56 crore CIFs (which also include savings certificates, term deposit accounts, etc) have been seeded with Aadhaar. JS, DBT pointed out that Aadhaar seeding is very low in this case, and the Department may undertake necessary actions to expedite the same to achieve 100% seeding by December 31, 2017. It was further suggested that all PPF accounts and CIF numbers may be linked with Aadhaar and the Department may share its suggestions on establishing a common repository of all PPF accounts using Aadhaar as the identifier.

6. Deputy Director, M/o Labour & Employment stated the Universal Account Number (UAN) provides portability for the employees covered under EPF. It was informed that 14 crore out of 4 crore active subscribers’ records have been seeded with Aadhaar. It was discussed that this willenable portability of EPF accounts when the details of Bank Account, Aadhaar and PAN areseeded in UAN database of the employees and are verified by employer on change of job. It was suggested that Aadhaar seeding of all may be taken up priority.

7. Deputy Secretary, Budget, D/o Economic Affairs stated that a host of small saving schemes including PPF are Operated by post offices, public sector banks and select private secror banks and Aadhaar seeding is being undertaken in all these accounts. JS, DBT Mission enquired if the. Department is taking any initiative to have a centralised platform for all savings schemes, given that all banks use different systems and Operate in silos. It was discussed that the Department may examine the matter and share updates in this regard.

8. After detailed deliberations, the following were agreed upon.

i. All stakeholder Departments to ensure 100% Aadhaar seeding of GPF, PPF and EPF accounts by December 31, 2017.

ii. All Departments to examine the possibility of developing common platforms for their respective service subscribers/employees/account holders using Aadhaar as the unique identifier to ensure portability across the financial system.

iii. DBT Mission to hold a review meeting with senior officers of all stakeholder Departments in the second week of September. 2017 to discuss the issue further.

Annexure-I

No. D-11011/36/2016-DBT (Cab.)

Government of India

Cabinet Secretariat

DBT Mission

4th Floor, Shivaji Stadium Annexe

Rajiv Chowk, New Delhi- 110001

Dated: 29th August, 2017

Subject: Aadhaar linking and interoperability of General Provident Fund (GPF), Public Provident Fund (PPF) and Employees’ Provident Fund (EPF) accounts-regarding.

The undersigned is directed to forward herewith a copy of record of discussion of the meeting held under the chairmanship of Joint Secretary, DBT Mission, Cabinet Secretariat on 25.08.2017 at 11.00 AM on the subject mentioned above for information and further necessary action, please.

Sd/-

(Tulsipriya Rajkumari)

Assistant Director

DBT Mission

Employees' Provident Fund Organisation

(Ministry of Labour, Govt. of India)

Head Office

Bhavishya Nidhi Bhawan, 14- Bhikaiji Cama Place, New Delhi - 110066

(CENTRAL ANALYSIS & INTELLIGENCE UNIT)

No.CAIU/011(44)2016/Aadhar/10273

Date: 22.09.2017

To
All ACCs (Zones) including ACC (ASD),
All RPFC-I/ RPFC 11 (Regional Offices),

Sub:- Aadhaar linking and interoperability of General Provident Fund (GPF), Public Provident Fund (PPF) and Employees’ Provident Fund (EPF) -regarding.

Sir,

Please find enclosed herewith a letter No.D-11011/36/2016-DBT (Cab.) dated 29.08.2017 received from Assistant Director, Cabinet Secretariat, DBT Mission forwarding therewith record of discussions of the meeting held under the Chairmanship of Joint Secretary, DBT Mission on 25.08.2017, wherein it has been directed that all the Departments should ensure 100% of Aadhaar seeding by December 31,2017.

2. It is requested to implement the instructions issued by the Cabinet Secretariat, DBT Mission, New Delhi for seeding of Aadhaar by December 31, 2017.

[This issues with the approval of ACC-II (CAIU)].

Yours faithfully,

Encl: As above

(A.K. Mandal)

Regional P. F. Commissioner-I(CAIU)

Friday, 22 September 2017

CHALO DELHI FROM 09,10,11 NOVEMBER 2017

DAILY 2hrs. PERMISSION FROM 4PM TO 6PM TO WOMEN EMPLOYEES TO PLAY BATUKAMMA AT TELANGANA POSTAL CIRCLE

Comreds according to our postal co-ordination committee of NFPE appeal letter to CPMG, Telangana Circle, the officer is kind enough to grant 2hrs permission to women employees to play Telangana traditional & State festival of BATHUKAMMA from 4pm to 6pm wef 20th to 29th September. ln this connection the Circle Unions of P-III & P-IV & GDS are thank full to the CPMG, Telangana Circle, Hyderabad.....

Circle Secretaries of Telangana Circle, Hyderabad.

See Circle Office Order's Below.

All the Circle Office Bearers, Br/Dvnl secretaries & Active members are requested to implementing the CO orders by the Divisional Heads in Telangana Circle...

Circle Secretaries of P-III, P-IV & GDS

Seminar opposing NPS and contractisation at St. George hospital auditorium CSTM, Mumbai by the State & Central government employees.
Comrades,
This is another attack on Central Government employees.
The Govt decided to close down 12 out of 17 Govt of India Printing Presses. The Cabinet rejected the recommendation of the Parliamentary Standing Committee consisting of 32 MPs NOT TO CLOSE DOWN ANY GIPs. But it accepted the report of Group of Secretaries Committee's recommendation TO CLOSE DOWN.

Confederation National Secretariat calls upon all C-O-Cs and Affiliates to conduct protest demonstrations at all centres and dharnas in front of all GIPs and send resolutions to the Prime Minister = M.Krishnan SG.

Forwarded as received from com. Krishnan.

CABINET DECIDED TO CLOSE DOWN TWELVE GOVERNMENT OF INDIA PRESSES.

HOLD PROTEST DEMONSTRATIONS AND DHARNAS.

Government decided to close down 12 out of 17 Government of India Presses.

Cabinet rejected recommendation of the Parliamentary standing committee consisting of 32 MPs not to close down any Government of India Presse and accepted the report of Group of Secretaries to close down

Confederation National Secretariat calls upon all C-O-Cs and Affiliates to conduct protest demonstrations at all Centers and Dharnas in front of all Government of India Presses and send resolutions to Prime Minister.

M. Krishnan

Secretary General

Confederation

ABOUT CGHS: FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS WITH ANSWERS

CLICK HERE TO VIEW all questions & answers

APPROXIMATE DA 6%

Expected DA and DR Calculator from January 2018 for CG Employees and Pensioners

A simple online tool to calculate the expected Dearness Allowance and Dearness Relief with input of AICPIN (Consumer Price Index for Industrial Workers BY 2001=100) from January 2018 for Central Government Employees and Pensioners.

EXPECTED DA

JULY-17

12 Month Total	3328
278+277+278+277+275+274+274+275+277+278+280+285=3328
12 Month Average	277.33 (3328/12)
Increased Over 261.42	6.09 (277.33 - 261.42) / 261.42) * 100
Approximate DA%	6

AICPIN for the month of July 2017 – 5 Points Increased (285)

Consumer Price Index for Industrial Workers (CPI-IW) – July 2017. The All India CPI-IW for July, 2017 increased by 5 points and pegged at 285. The Index increased by 1.79% between June, 2017 and July, 2017 when compared with the increase of 1.08% for the corresponding months of last year

Month / Year	AICPIN
JANUARY 2017	274 (-1)
FEBRUARY 2017	274 (0)
MARCH 2017	275 (+1)
APRIL 2017	277 (+2)
MAY 2017	278 (+1)
JUNE 2017	280 (+2)
Total Increased	6 Points
Month / Year	AICPIN
JULY 2017	285 (+5)
AUGUST 2017
SEPTEMBER 2017
OCTOBER 2017
NOVEMBER 2017
DECEMBER 2017
Total Increased	?

Source: https://7thpaycommissionnews.in/

Circle Relaxation Committee Meeting on 20.9.2017 in Telangana Circle : Recommended & Rejected GDS Compassionate Engagements

Is it really mandatory to link Aadhaar with bank account and mobile

We have all been getting repeated reminders from mobile service providers and banks via text messages and other means that it is mandatory to link our phone numbers and bank accounts with the 12-digit unique identification number Aadhaar. Failing which, our bank accounts and mobile numbers will cease to exist, if the seeding is not done within the stipulated deadline-- December 31, 2017 for bank accounts and February 28, 2018 for mobile numbers.

Screenshot of a banking app pop-up

While the government has indeed directed telecom companies and banks to get this done, is this really mandatory or even legal?

We spoke to Supreme Court lawyer Apar Gupta to understand the legalities around this.

For starters, before the deadline, banks and mobile service providers cannot disable your account or number, says Gupta. As far as the legality of the directive is concerned, he says "It's under a cloud and there are right now doubts that exist about the legality of the Aadhaar system."

The 'cloud' that Gupta mentions is formed from the landmark Supreme Court ruling in August which states that Indians enjoy a fundamental right to privacy, that it is intrinsic to life and liberty and thus comes under Article 21 of the Indian constitution.

"The right to privacy judgement got all of us very excited and there were questions which came up right after the judgement that what is its impact on Aadhaar. For this lawyers then went to the Supreme Court and said that you now have the right to privacy firmly established under the Constitution and now you need to apply it to the pending court cases which challenge the Aadhaar scheme.

Now, a lot of these court cases also challenge Aadhaar specifically being linked to a lot of government services which are now requiring it as a precondition for the service itself," says Gupta who had argued for petitioners in the Right to Privacy case and also represents those challenging Aadhaar.

These cases are due to be heard in November which is prior to the seeding deadlines, adds the lawyer who is a vocal critic of the Aadhaar scheme over concerns around security and privacy.

So, by November some legal clarity on whether Aadhaar is unconstitutional or if it's legal and justified is expected to emerge. This in turn will obviously have a bearing on whether all of us indeed need to get our Aadhaar seeded with our bank accounts and mobile numbers.

"People who believe that Aadhaar opens them up to a large array of concerns including privacy, profiling and even identity theft they should hold on. But again this is a very personal call each person has to take after they asses where they stand on this issue and how they personally assess the level of impact it's going to cause them," says Gupta.

It would be interesting to look back at the Supreme Court's judgement in the Aadhaar- PAN linking case here (which was delivered a couple of months before the right to privacy verdict), where the top court stated that while the government was right in asking for Aadhaar to be linked with the 10-digit alpha-numeric PAN, it was too harsh a punishment to deactivate someone's PAN altogether. It results in the "civil death" of a person as they are not able to function effectively in society, the court had stated. Having your bank account and mobile number disabled would also similarly result in "civil death" opines Gupta.

The Aadhaar-PAN issue will again be argued in November as it came before the right to privacy judgement, Gupta says.

The government on its part wants to link almost all essential services to Aadhaar to plug leakages and gaps that exist within the system as India moves towards digitisation. The Centre seems to believe that Aadhaar could be that proverbial 'silver bullet' that takes down terrorism, money laundering, black marketeering and other frauds, all at once.

Every resident who has an Aadhaar has their biometrics (fingerprints, iris scan) linked to the 12-digit unique identity. According to the government, over 99 per cent of adults in India are enrolled in the program, with nearly 90 per cent of the entire population coming under its fold.

Source:-The Times of India

Postal dept ‘outsources’ work, ‘agents’ fill in for delivery staff at post offices

The OPAs are paid an amount of Rs 5 per article delivered. Between April to August 31, the OPA appointed in Pune MFL delivered 2,198 articles and was paid a total commission of Rs 10,990.

The OPAs carry out jobs such as booking, picking up and delivering speed post, registered post, business parcel and express parcel within the city.

Shortage of staff at four post offices in the city has prompted the Pune Postal Department to, for the first time, ‘outsource’ some of its work. It has tied up with nine Outsource Postal Agents (OPAs) on the basis of work-based payments, and the OPAs have been filling in for the delivery staff since April.

“As per the circular by Department of Posts, if there are vacant posts in the post offices and excessive work load, the Postal Department can tie up with OPAs to get the work done. We have not tied up with any private agency, but with individuals, on the basis of work-based payment. The charge for the various works that they carry out are finalised by the department,” said Ganesh Sawaleshwarkar, postmaster general, Pune Region.

The OPAs carry out jobs such as booking, picking up and delivering speed post, registered post, business parcel and express parcel within the city.

While as many as nine OPAs were hired in four post offices across Pune Rural, Pune City West and Pune City East in April, only four OPAs are active on the field. On why the other OPAs were inactive, Sawaleshwarkar said, “They left because they felt the payment offered for the work was too less.”

Of the four post offices where the OPAs are active, two are in Hadapsar, one in Phursungi and one in Hinjewadi.

The OPAs are paid an amount of Rs 5 per article delivered. Between April to August 31, the OPA appointed in Pune MFL delivered 2,198 articles and was paid a total commission of Rs 10,990. Likewise, the three OPAs appointed at post offices in Pune City East delivered 1,17,440 articles between April and August. Altogether, an amount of Rs 5,87,200 was paid as commission between the three OPAs.

“Since it has only been a few months… we are yet to understand all the issues that can crop up in such an arrangement. Once we are able to understand them, we will be able to fix the loopholes,” said Sawaleshwarkar.

The Pune city postal department has 1,504 personnel across 149 post offices. The postal work handled by Pune Postal Department is significantly high. On an average, 49,000 speed post articles are handled by the computerised National Sorting Hub every day. Around 70 per cent growth in parcel traffic has been registered by Pune Region in 2016-17.

Source:- Indian Express App

Thursday, 21 September 2017

50 TH ANNIVERSARY OF SEPTEMBER 1968 STRIKE

50 TH ANNIVERSARY OF SEPTEMBER 1968 STRIKE . STATE INUAGRATION BY COM CHANDRANPILLA, CITU SECRETARY. AT TRIVENDRUM (KERALA) ON 19^th SEPTEMBER 2017

Order for Advance Payment of Salary in West Bengal and other circles

DoPT to Launch Mobile app for Retiring Central Govt Employees Today.

New Delhi: A mobile application will be launched on Wednesday for Retiring Central Govt Employees Today to help them monitor the progress of their pension settlement cases.
Retired employees will also be able to assess their superannuation funds and record complaints, if any, through the pension calculator, an official release issued by the Personnel, Public grievances and Pensions Ministry said on Tuesday.
The ministry already has a pensioners’ portal for this purpose.
The mobile app will be extending to the mobile handset all services meant for the pensioner which are currently available on the portal of the Department of Pension and Pensioners’ Welfare, it said.
With this application, a superannuating central government official will be able to monitor the progress of his or her pension settlement and retired officials will be able to assess or check details of their pension amounts through the pension calculator as well register grievances and get updates on orders issued by the department, it said.

The app will be launched by by MoS for DoPT Jitendra Singh. He will also award pensioners for outstanding contributions towards ‘Anubhav’ – a platform for retiring employees for sharing their experiences on working with the government.
To help government pensioners, a workshop on pre-retirement counselling of 300 central government employees who are on the verge of retirement is also scheduled to be held.
The objective of this workshop is to create awareness about post-retirement entitlements as well as to help them plan for life after retirement, the release said.
There will be four interactive sessions which will cover among other things a road map to retirement, medical facilities for pensioners and re-engagement of retired people for voluntary social activities, it said.
There will be a session on Income Tax and other benefits for senior citizens as well as investment and financial planning for retired people and the importance of writing a will, the release said.
The pension department in this programme will launch the first of a series of pension adalats, which seek to bring together an aggrieved pensioner, the department concerned and a bank or CGHS representative, wherever relevant, so that such cases could be settled across the table within the framework of rules.
The ‘Anubhav Awards 2017’ will be presented to 17 pensioners. The ‘Anubhav’ scheme was instituted at the behest of Prime Minister Narendra Modi who encouraged retiring or retired employees to submit their experiences while working in the government to create institutional wealth for the government for future governance and inspire the coming generations of government officials, it said
//COPY//

All 1.55 lakh post offices to offer payments bank service

NEW DELHI: India Post Payments Bank is gearing up to provide its financial services through all of 1.55 lakh post offices and 3 lakh employees by the end of 2018 -- which will create India's second-largest payments bank in terms of reach.

"We will have post bank footprint in every district by March 2018, and before the end of the calendar year, all 1.55 lakh post offices and every postman and grameen dak sevak, which is another 3 lakh, will be equipped with a device which will provide full range of payment solutions that we will be hosting," India Post Payments Bank (IPPB) Chief Executive Officer A P Singh said at an event organised by United Nations on Financial Inclusion.

In the private space, Airtel BSE -0.70 % Payments Bank, launched in January this year, started operations with a network of 2.5 lakh merchants.

Payments banks can accept deposits of up to Rs 1 lakh per account from individuals and small businesses.

The new model of banking allows mobile firms, supermarket chains and others to cater to banking requirements of individuals and small businesses. It will be set up as a differentiated bank and will confine its activities to acceptance of demand deposits, remittance services, Internet banking and other specified services.

IPPB offers an interest rate of 4.5 per cent on deposits up to Rs 25,000, 5 per cent on Rs 25,000-50,000 and 5.5 per cent on Rs 50,000-1,00,000.

"While our private sector counterparts will, I take it very positively, skim the market from the top, you need someone who works bottoms up. That is our choice," Singh said.

He said that similar to State Bank of India BSE 0.20 % that was created to take banking to people, IPPB is going to take digital payments to masses.

At the event, Telecom Regulatory Authority of India Chairman R S Sharma said transaction cost on digital payment should be very minimal and it should be made affordable.

IPPB, according to Singh, will use Aadhaar as payment address of an individual, indicating that the postal bank may bring the transaction charge close to 1 paisa.

"We will convert it (Aadhaar) into payment address. We will get this activated by offering a host of payment services," Singh said.

"We have taken up the challenge on ourselves as to how we make a Rs 10 transaction viable. Aadhaar authentication cost less than 1 paisa. There is no reason why a payment transaction should be transacting anything more," Singh said.

At present, private players and even public banks charge transaction fee even on digital payments, depending on the nature of the transaction.

Source : http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/

m-Aadhar – Proof of Identity for Rail Travel

Press Information Bureau
Government of India
Ministry of Railways

13-September-2017 16:34 IST

Ministry of Railways permits m-Aadhar as one of the prescribed proofs of Identity for Rail Travel Purpose.

Ministry of Railways has decided to permit m- Aadhar (Aadhar card on mobile app namely m- Aadhar launched by UIDAI) as one of the prescribed proofs of Identity for Rail Travel purpose in any reserved class.

m-Aadhar is a mobile app launched by UIDAI on which a person can download his/her Aadhar Card. It can be done only on the mobile number to which Aadhar has been linked. For showing Aadhar, the person has to open the app and enter his/ her password to show the Aadhar Card.

m-Aadhar when shown by the passenger on his/her mobile after entering the password should be accepted as proof of identity for undertaking journey in any reserved class over Indian Railways. It is effective from 8th September 2017.

//PIB//

1% DA ORDERS TO C.G.EMPLOYEES WEF 01-07-2017 DA-from-01-07-2017-fin-min-order-20-09-2017

productivity Linked Bonus for Regular Postal Employees and GDS ( 2016-2017)

TRAVEL ENTITLEMENT OF LTC TO C.G.EMPLOYEES-DOPT OM

ltc-travel-entitlement-in-7th-cpc-dopt-order-page1