Weeks ahead of the festival of lights Diwali, the Narendra Modi government has announced bonuses for Indian Railways employees. The Union Cabinet today approved payment of a Productivity Linked Bonus (PLB) of 78 days for Rs 2028.57 crore to 11,72,240 railway employees in recognition of the excellent performance by the Railway staff.
“The amount will be paid to various categories, of Railway staff like Track maintainers, Loco Pilots, Train Managers (Guards), Station Masters, Supervisors, Technicians, Technician Helpers, Pointsman, Ministerial staff and other Group XC staff. The payment of PLB acts as an incentive to motivate the railway employees for working towards improvement in the performance of the Railways,” said the government in a statement.
Payment of PLB to eligible railway employees is made each year before the Durga Puja/ Dusshera holidays. This year also, PLB amount equivalent to 78 days’ wages is being paid to about 11.72 lakh non-gazetted Railway employees.
The maximum amount payable per eligible railway employee is Rs 17,951 for 78 days. The above amount will be paid to various categories, of Railway staff like Track maintainers, Loco Pilots, Train Managers (Guards), Station Masters, Supervisors, Technicians, Technician Helpers, Pointsman, Ministerial staff and other Group ‘C staff.
The performance of Railways in the year 2023-2024 was very good. Railways loaded a record cargo of 1588 Million Tonnes and carried nearly 6.7 Billion Passengers. “Many factors contributed to this record performance. These include improvement in infrastructure due to infusion of record Capex by the Government in Railways, efficiency in operations and better technology etc,” said the government.