Delhi, October 22: Several states announced the Dearness Allowance (DA) hike for government employees on the recommendations of 7th pay commission ahead of the festive season of Diwali. The central government increased dearness allowances by 4 per cent for its employees in September. Centre had also hiked the dearness relief (DR) for pensioners with same percentage on 7th pay commission recommendations.

The Dearness allowance is paid by the government to help employees cope with rising due to high inflation. The DA is calculated as a percentage of the basic salary of government employees.

Here is the list of states that announced DA hikes in the last few weeks.

Uttar Pradesh

Uttar Pradesh: On 18 October, the UP government had issued an order to increase DA and dearness relief of its employees and pensioners from 34% to 38% with effect from 1 July. According to a tweet by Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath’s office, “UP CM Yogi Adityanath has decided to increase the rate of dearness allowance and dearness relief from the present 34% to 38% with effect from 01.07.2022 keeping in mind the wider interest of the state employees and pensioners/ family pensioners.”

Haryana

Earlier this week, the Haryana government announced a 4% hike in the dearness allowance (DA) for the state government employees who have been drawing their salary as per the 7th Pay Commission structure. The DA has been raised from the existing 34% to 38% of the basic pay with effect from July 1, 2022. The increased DA will be paid with the salary of October while the three months’ arrears from July onwards will be payable in November.

Chhattisgarh

Chhattisgarh: On 14 October, CM Bhupesh Baghel hike DA by 5 per cent, taking it to 33 per cent. The hike will benefit around 3.80 lakh state government employees. will benefit from the hike. The hike will be effective from 1 October 2022.

Jharkhand

The Jharkhand government has decided to increase the dearness allowance (DA) for state government employees and the dearness relief (DR) for its pensioners by 4%, taking it to 38% from existing 34% with effect from July 1 this year. The decided is expected to benefit around two lakh state government employees and 1.35 lakh pensioners.

Delhi

In line with the Centre’s decision, the Delhi government issued an order to increase the dearness allowance of its employees by 4%.

Rajasthan

The Rajasthan government approved a 4% increase in dearness allowance to state employees and pensioners soon after Union government’s announcement. The latest hike took the dearness allowance for state government employees and pensioners to 38%, with effect from July 1.

Odisha

In September, the Odisha government announced a 3 per cent hike in dearness allowance for its employees and pensioners. Chief minister Naveen Patnaik approved the proposal for increasing DA from 31 per cent to 34 per cent, effective from January 1, 2022. About four lakh employees and 3.5 lakh pensioners will be benefitted from the hike.

How to calculate Dearness Allowance

For central government employees: The DA is calculated as — {(Average of the All-India Consumer Price Index (Base year -2001 =100) for the last 12 months -115.76)/115.76} x 100.

Meanwhile, for central public sector employees, the DA is calculated as — {(Average of the All-India Consumer Price Index (Base year -2001 =100) for the last 3 months -126.33)/126.33} x 100