When the Covid-19 pandemic broke out in early 2020 in the country and thousands of people started reeling from financial crunch due to job losses and shut businesses, the government tweaked certain guidelines and norms with regard to withdrawal of money from provident fund and National Pension System (NPS) to help people tide over financial difficulties during those difficult times. One of the reliefs given to NPS subscribers was that they were allowed to withdraw money online partially from their account through self-declaration.
NPS subscribers were exempted from submitting supporting documents to substantiate the valid reasons for partial withdrawal. However, with the pandemic situation improving in the country, the Pension Fund Regulatory and Development Authority (PFRDA) has decided to tweak some rules regarding money withdrawal from the NPS deposit.
The PFRDA has issued a new order regarding the NPS withdrawals. As per the new order, subscribers belonging to all government entities (Centre, State and Central Autonomous Body) can now submit their application for NPS Partial Withdrawal and it will have to be submit-ted only to the nodal officer.
“With the abating of the pandemic-related difficulties & relaxation of lock down restrictions, the issue examined after taking into consideration of the prevalent practices, circumstances and law, it has been decided to make it mandatory for all the Government sector subscribers (central/state govt & central/state autonomous bodies) to submit their requests through their associated nodal offices,” the PFRDA said in a circular.
The retirement fund regulator, in January 2021, had issued a circular allowing partial withdrawals under NPS “through self-declaration for the benefit of subscribers as a special dispensation to cope with the Covid pandemic in order to protect the subscribers’ interest and ease the burden of nodal officers including POPs from verification and authorization”.
