6 companies have been empanelled by the Governmentn as Pension Fund Managers(PFM) for providing pension and annuity products under the New Pension Scheme(NPS) . They are LIC, SBI Life, ICICI Prudential, Bajaj Allianz Life, Reliance Life and Star Union Dal-Ichi. Out of these only two are from PSUs and all the others from private sector.

Earlier the Central and state government employees were getting pension as defined pension. But for the employees recruited on or after 01-01-2004 the New Pension Scheme has been introduced which is a contributory pension scheme. Despite strong protest from the employees, the NPS was implemented by  Central and all state governments except the left-led states of Kerala, W.Bengal and Tripura.

Recovery will be made from the employees to Provident Fund. The government will also contribute. This fund will be managed by the Pension Fund Managers. They can invest the fund according to their decision. 60% of the amount will be refunded at the time of retirement and 40% will be put in annuity for payment of pension.

The private employees can accept the scheme. But so far, out of 3 million employees under NPS, 90% are from government or PSUs only.It is mandatory for them.

The Central and State Government employees have strongly opposed the scheme and asked the government to continue he pension scheme as per CCS (Pension ) Rules according to which the pension will be paid as defined pension and not contributory pension. A Parliament March was also organised in this connection.

The fight will continue for defined pension scheme.