NTPC, DVC may join the New Pension System

   On the heels of the state-owned Nalco joining the New Pension System, the
public sector power firms such as NTPC and Damodar Valley

    Corporation (DVC) have shown interest in moving their retirement funds to the
scheme.

    "NTPC and DVC have shown interest in joining the New Pension System (NPS). We
are holding talks with them," a senior Pension Fund Regulatory and Development
Authority (PFRDA) official told PTI today.

    The nation's largest power producer NTPC employees around 24,500 while DVC has
over 11,000 in its rolls.

    Recently, the interim regulator PFRDA wrote to the Department of Public
Enterprises to help the Central PSUs bring their employees into the NPS for
pension savings beyond the mandatory contributions at 24 per cent of the salary
to the Employees Provident Fund Organisation.

    "We expect more PSUs to put their retirement funds in the coming days into the
NPS," the official added.

    Initially, the NPS was launched for Central government employees joining service
from January 1, 2004, but from last May it was extended to all citizens.

    According to the information available on the PFRDA website, as many as 6,90,274
subscribers have joined the NPS till this January 2, which include 3,119 from
the unorganised sector.

Out of this , the maximum 5,64,705 subscribers are the Central Government
employees, apart from 1,20,517 state government employees.

The total corpus under these schemes is close to Rs 3,500 crore.

National Aluminium Company became the first public sector undertaking to move
its employees retirement funds to the New Pension System to contribute six per
cent of the basic pay into the NPS.



SOURCE - ECONOMIC TIMES