EPFO hikes death insurance under EDLI scheme to ₹7L

NEW DELHI: India’s retirement fund manager on Friday raised the death insurance benefits for subscribers of its employees’ deposit-linked insurance (EDLI) scheme, at a time the coronavirus pandemic is wreaking havoc across the country.

In a gazette notification, the Employees’ Provident Fund Organisation (EPFO) said the minimum death insurance has been increased to ₹2.5 lakh and the maximum to ₹7 lakh, from the earlier limits of ₹2 lakh and ₹6 lakh, respectively.

Among the EPFO’s 5 crore active subscribers, over 20 lakh are EDLI subscribers.

“The following proviso shall be inserted and shall be deemed to have been inserted with effect from the 15th day of February 2020... provided that the assurance benefit shall not be less than two lakh and fifty thousand rupees,” the notification said.

It means the lower limit of this insurance benefit will be effective retrospectively from February 15, 2020.

“In the second proviso, for the words six lakh rupees, the words seven lakh rupees shall be substituted,” the notification said.

“While the lower limit is coming with retrospective effect, the upper limit has a prospective effect,” said labour secretary Apurva Chandra.

According to the gazette notification, the Union labour ministry had increased the minimum death insurance to ₹2.5 lakh from ₹2 lakh in 2018 but only for two years, and it had expired on February 14, 2020.