The Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs approved the IT Modernization Project - Handheld devices will be provided to all the Grameen Dak Sevak (GDS)

The Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs approved the IT Modernization Project – Phase-II proposal of the Department of Posts. The decision is to computerize all the Departmental and Grameen Dak Sevak (GDS) posts offices in the country. The approval has also been accorded for creation of IT infrastructure including establishment of Data Centre, Networking of the Departmental post offices, development of scalable, integrated and modular software for all the operations of the Department of Posts. The Project will be implemented over a three year period covering 2010-11, 2011-12 and 2012-13.

The total expenditure involved in this project will be Rs.1877.20 crore and it will cover all the Post Offices throughout the country in all the State and Union Territories. The Department of Posts will be floating tenders for procurement of hardware and development of software. Pilots will be held in rural and urban post offices. The final roll out will be completed by September 2012.

Handheld devices will be provided to all the Grameen Dak Sevak (GDS) Post Offices in the rural areas and necessary software application developed. Banking solution will be implemented for the Post Office Savings Bank (POSB) scheme. Software Integration solutions will be developed for mail operations enabling tracking solutions for all registered and Speed Post articles.

The Postal Life Insurance services will be available in all the Post Offices including rural post offices in the country through computers and rural ICT devices. Comprehensive training will be given to staff in Customer relations, application, IT management and system training skills.

Background: The Post Office presently handles 654 crore pieces of mail annually. POSB has a corpus fund of Rs.5,63,000 crore. Significant trends like liberalization and globalization; urbanization, increased demand for financial services, increased funding by government for weaker sections and rural sector, make it imperative that India Post develop new processes and supporting technology.

Postal Assistants exam pattern/format:

Postal Assistants exam pattern/format:

Cabinet Clears the Direct Tax Code (DTC) Bill in Parliament.

Cabinet Clears the Direct Tax Code (DTC) Bill in Parliament.

The Cabinet at its hour-long meeting chaired by the Prime Minister discussed at length various provisions of the DTC Bill, which will seek to bring about radical reforms and simplification in direct tax structure including the Income Tax rates and exemptions.

Features:* It will be effective From April 1, 2011.
* It will Replace the old Income Tax Act which is 50 years old.
* Employees have to pay less direct tax in each slab of income.
* Limit of exemption for salaries employees : 2 Lakhs.
* Limit of exemption for senior citizens: 2.5 Lakhs.
* Tax for income between Rs. 2 lakhs - Rs. 5 lakhs: 10%
* Tax for income between Rs. 5 lakhs - Rs. 10 lakhs: 20%
* Tax for income over Rs.10 Lakhs 30 %.
* Corporate Tax 30 %.

Latest Dearness Allowance, HRA, TA, Overtime and other Allowances Rates.

Various rates of Dearness Allowance, HRA, TA, Conveyance Allowance, Project Allowance, Overtime Allowance, Cash Handling Allowance etc are given below.

1. Dearness Allowance (DA):

With effect from 1.1.2006, Dearness allowance is granted to compensate price increase above to which the revised pay scales relate. This will be sanctioned twice a year, payable from 1st January and 1st July.

(More on Dearness Allowance and How to calculate DA).

The following table shows the rates of Dearness Allowance (as on August 2010)

Date From Which Payable	Rate (in Percentage)
1-1-2007	6
1-7-2007	9
1-1-2008	12
1-7-2008	16
1-1-2009	22
1-7-2009	27
1-1-2010	35
1-7-2010	45 (Expected)

2. House Rent Allowance (HRA):

Classification of Cities	Rates (In Percentage)
X	30
Y	20
Z	10

3. Special Compensatory Hill Area Allowance:

Grade Pay	Bad Climate Allowance(in Rs)	Composite HCA (in Rs)
Rs 5400 & Above and HAG + and above	400	600
Less than Rs 5400	240	480

4. Project Allowance:

Grade Pay	Rate Per Month
Rs. 5400 and above and pay scale of HAG + and above	1500
Less than Rs 5400	1000

5. Bad Climate Allowance:

Grade Pay	Rate per Month
Rs. 5400 and above and pay scale of HAG + and above	400
Less than Rs 5400	240

6. Transport Allowance (TA):

Grade Pay	Rate of TA per Month Classified as A-1, A Cities	Rate of TA per Month Other Cities
Rs. 5400 and above	3200 + DA	1600 + DA
Rs. 4200, 4600 and above Rs. 4800	1600 + DA	800 + DA
Below Rs. 4200 but drawing pay in the pay band equal to Rs. 7440 & above	1600 + DA	800 + DA
Below Rs. 4200 but drawing pay in the pay band less than Rs. 7440	600 + DA	400 + DA

7. Overtime Allowance:

Office staff

Emoluments pre-revised Scale	For the First one hour ( Per Hour)	Thereafter (in Rs) (Per Hour)
Rs. 2201 and above	NIL	12.50

Operative Staff

	Rate of OTA per Hour(in Rs)
Emoluments	For Working Days	For Working Days	For Working Days	For Sundays & Holidays	For Sundays & Holidays	For Sundays & Holidays
	48 Hrs Duty	44 Hrs Duty	42 1/2 Hrs Duty	48 Hrs Duty	44 Hrs Duty	42 1/2 Hrs Duty
2201 and above	15.85	17.25	19.90	21.15	23.05	22.85

Staff Car Drivers:

Emoluments	Rate of OTA per hour
	Up to the first one hour in excess of the prescribed hours of duty	Thereafter
Rs. 2201 and above	NIL	16.50

Casual Employees:

Category	Hourly Rate of OTA
Employees drawing Minimum wage	1/8 th of the daily wage
Employees drawing 1/30 of the pay at the minimum of the relevant pay scale + DA for 8 Hrs work per day	Minimum of the relevant pay scale plus DA admissible at the rates divided by (30*8)
Casual workers having temporary status	Like in the case of Office staff mentioned above.

8. Cash Handling Allowance to Cashiers:

Amount of Average Monthly Cash Disbursed	Rate Per Month
Up to Rs. 50,000	150
Over Rs. 50,000 & Up to 2,00,000	300
Over Rs. 2,00,000 & Up to 5,00,000	400
Over Rs. 5,00,000 & Up to 10,00,000	500
Over 10,00,000	600

9. Conveyance Allowance

Average Monthly travel on Official Duty ( In KM )	Own Motor Car (In Rs)	Other Conveyance ( In Rs)
201-300	1,120	370
301-450	1,680	480
451-600	2,070	640
601-800	2,430	750
Above 800 KM	3,000	850

10. Conveyance Allowance to Medical Officers:

Mode of Conveyance	CHS Maximum per Month	CHS Minimum per month	Non CHS Maximum per Month	Non CHS Minimum per Month
Their own motor car	3,300	160	550	80
ho maintain scooter / motor cycle	1,080	80	180	40
who do not maintain either car or motor cycle / scooter	900	60	150	30

11. Tribal Area Allowances:

Same as Bad Climate Allowance

12. Hard Area Allowance:

25 % of Basic Pay + NPA

13. Non-Practising Allowance:

Admissible to CHS officers and veterinary doctors at 25% of their Band + Grade pay where as BP + Grade pay does not exceed 85,000.

14. Caretaking Allowance:

10 % aggregate of pay in the pay band and Grade Pay.

15. Split Duty Allowance:

Rs. 200 per month.

16. Island Special Duty Allowance:

Areas	Rate Per Month of Basic Pay + NPA (In Percentage)
Areas around Capital Towns ( Port Blair in A & N Islands, Kavaratti and Agatti in Lakshadweep )	12.5
Difficult Areas: ( North & Middle Andaman, South Andaman , all islands of Lakshadweep (excluding above)	20
More Difficult areas: ( Little Andaman, Nicobar Group of Islands, Narcondam Islands, East Islands in A & N Islands, Minicoy in Lakshadweep)	25

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