RSCWS Urges Finance Ministry to Include Pensioners in 8th Pay Commission Benefits

RSCWS Urges Finance Ministry to Include Pensioners in 8th Pay Commission Benefits

Railways Senior Citizens Welfare Society (RSCWS) has formally requested the Ministry of Finance to ensure that Central Government pensioners and family pensioners are included in the benefits of the 8th Central Pay Commission (CPC).

The appeal was made through a detailed letter dated 11 November 2025, addressed to the Hon’ble Finance Minister of India.

The representation highlights that the Gazette Notification regarding the 8th CPC focuses mainly on revising the pay structure of serving Central Government employees.

According to RSCWS, these employees will eventually become pensioners, and therefore, the benefits of the 8th CPC should logically extend to all existing pensioners as well. The Society argued that since the 5th CPC, the Government has consistently followed the principle of parity between serving and retired employees.

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RSCWS noted that pensioners form a vulnerable section of society, heavily dependent on pension and family pension to manage rising living costs and medical expenses. It reiterated that a pension is a “deferred wage” and must be revised in line with pay commission recommendations to maintain dignity and social security for retired employees.

The letter urges the Finance Ministry to modify or clarify the Terms of Reference of the 8th CPC so that pension revision is explicitly included for all categories of retirees, including those covered under pre-7th CPC pay scales.

It also recommends that the same fitment factor applied to serving employees under the 8th CPC should be uniformly applied to pensioners to maintain parity, citing the Supreme Court judgment in the D.S. Nakara vs Union of India (1983) case.

The Society also compared past pay commissions, noting that the 6th CPC brought notable improvements in pension and the 7th CPC introduced pension parity for pre-2016 retirees.

However, the 8th CPC appears to focus largely on NPS and OPS-related matters under the pension category, creating confusion regarding coverage for existing pensioners. RSCWS urged the Government to resolve this ambiguity through a clarificatory notification.

In its concluding appeal, RSCWS requested three key actions from the Government:

• Clear inclusion of pensioners and family pensioners under 8th CPC benefits
• Application of the same fitment formula as serving employees
• Early issuance of guidelines to prevent delays in pension revision

The representation reflects widespread expectations among the pensioners’ community that the upcoming 8th CPC should continue the long-established principle of fairness and parity in pension reforms.