The Indian government has reaffirmed its stance to keep the minimum pension at ₹1,000 under EPS-95, despite ongoing demands and Supreme Court rulings favouring an increase to ₹7,500, citing scheme sustainability concerns.
India’s government has not announced any increase in the minimum pension under the Employees’ Pension Scheme, despite renewed demands to raise it from ₹1,000 to ₹7,500 a month. The issue returned to Parliament after Ramvir Singh Bidhuri asked whether ministers planned to lift the floor for EPS-95 pensioners, and whether the higher-pension route opened by the Supreme Court had been fully implemented.
In response, Shobha Karandlaje, the Minister of State for Labour and Employment, said the government is still providing the minimum pension of ₹1,000 a month through budgetary support. According to the ministry, there is no immediate proposal to move the minimum to ₹7,500, and the existing payment is being maintained alongside broader efforts to protect the scheme’s long-term health.
The government’s reply also underlined how EPS is financed. Employer contributions of 8.33% of wages, together with the Centre’s 1.16% contribution, apply to a monthly wage ceiling of ₹15,000, and benefits are paid from that pooled corpus. The ministry said the fund is valued every year, a point it appears to have used to justify caution over any steep increase in payouts.
The scale of the scheme remains large. Karandlaje said 85,84,604 pensioners were receiving monthly EPS benefits as of 31 March 2026, with total pension disbursals for the scheme at ₹15,819.28 crore. She also said 1,49,806 pension payment orders had been issued to applicants seeking higher pensions after the Supreme Court’s 4 November 2022 ruling, which allowed eligible workers who had contributed on wages above the statutory ceiling to opt for a pension based on actual salary, subject to conditions. The latest parliamentary reply leaves the ₹7,500 demand unresolved and confirms that the minimum pension remains at ₹1,000 for now.
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