LIC employees to get 16% salary hike, 5-day-work week and more

Employees of Life Insurance Company (LIC) must be rejoicing after knowing that the Department of Financial Services (DFS) has reportedly just raised their wages by 16%. Over one lakh employees of LIC will benefit from the wage revision that has come along with several other perks. 

The salary hike has come after a really long time. Prior to this, LIC employees got a wage hike nine years ago in August 2012. This was in contrast to LIC’s culture, according to which the company usually revises the salary every five years. Since the gap between the salary revision was more than usual, employees were expecting about a 35% hike in their wages. However, they would now have to settle for a 16% raise. 

In addition to the salary hike, LIC employees are also going to enjoy benefits such as a 5-day-work week with immediate effect, according to media reports. Unlike other public sector bank employees, LIC employees can now enjoy every Saturday as an off. It is important to note that several employee organisations were demanding a five-day workweek for quite some time now. 

Moreover, LIC has also approved an ‘additional special allowance’ for all cadres. The newly introduced allowances range from Rs 1,500 to Rs 13,500 per month and will be represented under dearness allowance (DA) under accounts books. However, it won’t count towards other DAs such as city compensation allowance (CCA), gratuity, house rent allowance (HRA), paid leave encashment and superannuation benefit, etc.

All the steps taken by the LIC in favour of its employees have come at a time when the company is gearing up for its initial public offering (IPO), which could be the largest IPO India has ever witnessed.