Covid-19 Lockdown Impact: No Transport Allowance For Central Government Employees

Bhubaneswar: The Central government has clarified that no transport allowance would be paid to employees who did not attend office during the nationwide COVID-19 lockdown period.

“Transport allowance (TA) is provided to Central Government Employees to compensate them for the amount spend on commuting between residence and office. The Central government employees who could not attend office in a whole calendar month during the lockdown period are not eligible to draw transport allowance for that month as these employees had not incurred any expenditure for commuting to office,” a circular issued by the Department of Expenditure on December 1 states.

The Central Government had earlier exempted certain employees from attending office during the lockdown period in a bid to curb COVID-19 infection spread.

Physically-disabled employees and pregnant women employees who were exempted to attend office will not get TA. It has also been clarified that non-entitled officers/officials, who are temporarily provided with facility of official car for commuting between office and residence throughout the whole calendar month on account of non-availability of public transport facility due to Covid-19 pandemic are also not eligible to draw TA.

Non-entitled officials who were temporarily provided with the facility of official car for commuting between office and residences throughout the whole calendar month on account of unavailability of public transport facility due to COVID-19 pandemic, are also not eligible to draw transport allowance, the circular added.