Bengal DA Hike News: The West Bengal government has raised the dearness allowance for its state employees and pensioners by 3%. Finance Minister Chandrima Bhattacharya announced this decision during the presentation of the state budget for the fiscal year 2023-24, which amounts to ₹3.39-lakh crore. This move comes after recent protests by state government officials who demanded their pending dearness allowance payments.
The announcement followed a debate in the Lok Sabha where BJP and TMC MPs discussed the matter of pending dearness allowance payments. BJP MP Saumitra Khan had expressed his concern on the issue, stating that West Bengal government employees were on a hunger strike and not receiving their dearness allowance.
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Meanwhile, the Centre is likely to increase the dearness allowance for over 1 crore employees and pensioners by around 4% in the near future. This increase will bring the dearness allowance from 38% to 42%. The dearness allowance for employees and pensioners is calculated based on the latest Consumer Price Index for Industrial Workers (CPI-IW), which is published monthly by the Labour Bureau, a wing of the Labour Ministry.
Apart from the increase in dearness allowance, the West Bengal budget has proposed waiving agricultural income tax on tea gardens for two years and extending credit facilities to young entrepreneurs. The state GDP is expected to grow at 8.4% and the industry at 7.8% during the ongoing 2022-23 fiscal year. The Finance Minister also announced the creation of a ₹350-crore fund to provide credit of up to ₹5 lakh to 2 lakh young entrepreneurs. Additionally, the budget proposed full waiver of charges on irrigation water supplied to farms and the construction of 11,500 km of rural roads at a cost of ₹3,000 crore.
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