EPF Interest Rate: Know that a central board of EPFO decides at what rate the interest should be given.
Other schemes including Sukanya Samriddhi Yojana, Senior Citizen Savings Scheme and PPF have lower interest rates than EPF.
Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman said in the Rajya Sabha on Monday that the proposed 8.1 percent interest rate on Employees’ Provident Fund (EPF) is better than the interest rates available on other small savings schemes and has been amended. It is based on the realities of the present times.
Proposal to reduce PF rate
The Finance Minister, in response to the discussion on the Appropriation Bills in the House, said that the Central Board of EPFO decides the interest rate on provident fund deposits and the board itself has proposed to reduce the PF rate to 8.1 percent for the financial year 2021-22. Have given.
Finance Minister compares other savings scheme
He said, ‘EPFO has a central board which decides the rate at which interest is to be given and they have not changed it for a long time. They have now changed it to 8.1 percent.
The Finance Minister said that the EPFO has called for keeping the interest rate at 8.1 percent, while the rates available in other schemes including Sukanya Samriddhi Yojana (7.6 percent), Senior Citizen Savings Scheme (7.4 percent) and PPF (7.1 percent) are very low.
Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman said that the valuation of the insurance company Life Insurance Corporation of India (LIC) has been done in a scientific manner and it has been disclosed in the prospectus submitted with SEBI regarding the IPO.
What is the share of the states in the tax?
He said that the share of states in the central tax is estimated to be Rs 8.17 lakh crore in 2022-23 and the revised estimate of Rs 7.45 lakh crore for the current financial year has already been released.
In the supplementary demand for grants, a proposal of Rs 5,000 crore has been made for infusion of capital in public sector insurance companies.
Referring to the supplementary demands for grants for 2021-22, the Finance Minister said that the government has asked for additional funds for infusion of fertilizer subsidy, capital in the National Bank for Financing Infrastructure and Development (NABARD). He said that apart from this, many works were done faster than expected, for which it was necessary to spend that time.
He said that a major part of the amount was done to give benefits of the schemes to the common people. The government itself took the burden of the high cost of urea and did not pass the burden on the farmers. Nirmala Sitharaman denied that the government has delayed in getting parliamentary approval for the additional expenditure incurred in the financial year 2018-19.
The Finance Minister made these remarks in response to the discussion in the House on the supplementary demands for grants for the financial year 2021-22 and the demands for additional grants for the financial year 2018-19. During the discussion, the members had said that the government has now presented the demands for additional grants for 2018-19.
He said that the matter was with the Public Accounts Committee and it had asked the government to seek approval from Parliament to regularize this additional expenditure.
He said that the government had received the committee’s report in February 2021 and the government was given time till June 2022 to take its approval. Following his reply, the House returned the relevant Appropriation Bills. Lok Sabha has already passed them.
