Interim Relief recommended by previous Pay Commissions

Whenever a Pay commission was constituted, the central government used to grant interim relief in order to preserve the current situation of central government employees until the wages are revised and to reduce the gap in wages to some extent between employees of the Central Government and public sector enterprises.

It was fallowed until fifth pay commission was constituted. The term interim relief itself refers that this is short term help to cope up with the prevailing economic conditions. As and when the recommendation of the pay commission is implemented, the amount paid as interim relief will be adjusted against the amount of arrears to be paid on account of wage revision. So granting of Interim relief is nothing but granting advance on proposed salary hike. One of the central government employees news website has posted some details about the interim relief granted at the time of various pay commission were constituted. It is given below for our readers reference..

Details of interim relief in the past

“….As everyone knows the Central Government has constituted the 7th Pay Commission and named its Chairmen recently. The decision of the government to constitute the 7th CPC has triggered many expectations among the central government employees. One among them was the merger of 50% DA with basic pay as it was done in the 5th CPC. But the 6th CPC did not recommend anything like that. It is understood that the employees are eagerly waiting for an economic relief from the soaring prices of essential commodities. There were instances of announcing interim relief (I.R) to the employees by a newly constituted pay commission, prior to implementation of their recommendations, in the past.

Let us look into some of them

Interim Relief by Second Pay Commission

Interim relief of Rs 5.p.m was granted by the 2nd pay commission with effect from the 1st july, 1957 to all employees drawing basic pay not exceeding Rs.250 per month.

Pay range	Dearness pay	Dearness allowance	Total of dearness allowance. Dearness pay and interim relief
	Rs	Rs	Rs
Up to Rs  50	20	25	45
Rs.51- 100	25	30	55
Rs.101- 150	27.50	32.50	60
Rs.151- 200	30	35	65
Rs.251- 300	32.50	37.50	70
Rs.301- 500	35	35	70

Interim Relief by Third Pay Commission

Interim relief as on 31.12.1972

Pay range	Dearness allowance	Portion treated as dearness pay	Interim relief
Below Rs.85	71	47	29
Rs.110-149	71	47	41
Rs.150-209	98	70	41
Rs.210-399	122	90	41
Rs.400-499	146	110	50

Interim Relief by Fourth Pay Commission

Rates of interim relief from 1.6.1983

The staff side of the national council (joint consultative machinery) had raised a demand relating to the parity of scale of pay of central government employees with public sector pay scales and pending acceptance of this demand, an interim relief to all central government employees was sanctioned at the rates indicated below.

Categories of employees/pay range	Amount of interim relief sanctioned Rs.
For employees drawing pay below Rs.300 p.m	50 p.m
For employees drawing pay of Rs.300 and above but below Rs 700 p.m	60 p.m
For employees drawing pay of Rs.700 and above but below Rs 1600p.m	70 p.m
For employees drawing pay of Rs.1600 and above but below Rs 2250 p.m	80 p.m
For employees drawing pay of Rs.1600 and above but below Rs 2250 p.m	100 p.m
Rates of interim relief from 1.3.1985

Rates of interim relief from 1.3.1985

The Fourth Pay Commission had recommended an Installment of interim relief at the rate of 10% of the basic pay of the employees subject to minimum of Rs.50 per month to be paid with effect from 1st march 1985.

Interim Relief by Fifth Pay Commission

First installment of interim relief to the central government employees from 16.9.1993

Interim relief of Rs.100/- p.m has been sanctioned to all central government employees w.e.f 16.9.1993.

The amount interim relief will neither be termed as ‘pay’ nor ‘allowance’ nor ‘wages’, accordingly this amount will not counted for any service benefit.

Second installment of interim relief from 1st April 1995

The Fifth Central Pay commission have recommended a further instalment of interim relief at the rate of of 10% of the basic pay to the employees subject to minimum of Rs .100 per month to be paid with effect from 1st April, 1995.

Third installment of interim relief from 1st April 1996

The Fifth Central Pay Commission in their interim report have recommended a further installment of interim relief at the rate of 10% of the basic pay to the employees subject to minimum of Rs .100 per month to paid with effect from 1st April, 1995.

The Fifth CPC, in para 105.11 of their report, had recommended that DA should be converted into Dearness Pay each time the DA increased by 50% over the base index used by the Pay Commission.

Accordingly Merger of 50% of Dearness Allowance / Dearness Relief with basic pay / pension to Central Government employees/pensioners was sanctioned w.e.f. 01/04/2004.

Interim Releif by 6th Pay Commission

The 6th pay commission after its constitution did not recommend or suggests any kind of interim relief or merging of DA with the basic pay. As of now the DA has touched 100% and the government is unable to satisfy employees. All federation and associations are pressurizing the government for the merger of 50% DA. They strongly suggest the central government for granting some kind of relief to the employees as the price of essential commodities is in the rise, the government should act upon to fulfill the expectation of the employees. The government should come up with merger 50%DA merger or some interim relief to the employees as early as possible.”