Employees of the Himachal Pradesh Electricity Board are demanding the restoration of the Old Pension Scheme, or OPS. They say that although the state government restored OPS in 2023, electricity board employees have not received its benefits.
The reason is that the Himachal Pradesh State Electricity Board Limited (HPSEBL), is a separate corporation. While OPS has been restored for most state government employees, electricity board employees continue to be covered under the National Pension System (NPS).
Under OPS, employees receive a fixed pension after retirement, generally calculated at around 50 percent of their last salary. Under NPS, a portion of the employee’s salary is contributed every month and invested. The retirement benefit depends on investment returns, so there is no fixed pension guarantee like OPS.
NPS was introduced in 2004 by the then Atal Bihari Vajpayee government, mainly because the long-term cost of OPS was considered a growing financial burden on the government. NPS, meanwhile, also requires employees to contribute.
In Himachal Pradesh, Chief Minister Sukhvinder Singh Sukhu’s government restored OPS for state employees in 2023. However, electricity board employees are still waiting for the scheme to be extended to them.
Employees argue that they deserve the same pension security as other state employees. The government and the board, however, face concerns over Himachal Pradesh’s financial position and the electricity board’s weak finances.
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