8th Pay Commission: Why Employee Bodies Are Demanding One Rank, One Pension for Level 1-18 Staff
Employee unions and pensioner associations have urged the 8th Central Pay Commission to extend ‘One Rank, One Pension’ to central government civilian employees across Pay Levels 1 to 18. The proposal seeks pension parity through notional pay fixation, accounting for promotions, increments and post upgrades after retirement.
Employee unions and pensioner associations have formally urged the 8th Central Pay Commission to extend the "One Rank, One Pension" (OROP) framework to all central government civilian employees across Pay Levels 1 to 18. The proposal seeks to eliminate longstanding disparities where personnel retiring from identical posts receive significantly different pensions based on their retirement date and the prevailing Pay Commission regime at the time of their exit.
Core Arguments for Civilian OROP
Under the current setup, OROP is limited to Armed Forces veterans, retired judges of the Supreme Court and High Courts, and former Comptrollers and Auditors General of India (CAG). Civilian staff retiring under the Old Pension Scheme (OPS) argue that leaving them out creates inter-temporal unfairness.
According to employee federations, two individuals who served in the same designation, held identical responsibilities, and completed comparable lengths of service often draw uneven monthly payouts simply because one retired earlier than the other. 8th Pay Commission: Check Level 6 to Level 8 Arrears Calculator Under Key Fitment Factors.
C. Srikumar, General Secretary of the All India Defence Employees’ Federation (AIDEF), noted that pension disparity persists across civil departments despite periodic pension revisions by successive commissions. Representatives from the All India New Pension Scheme Employees’ Federation echoed this concern, describing the gap between past and recent retirees as substantial.
The Mechanism: Notional Pay Fixation
To establish parity, unions have recommended adopting a "notional pay fixation" formula rather than linking post-retirement revisions solely to the historical pay scale in effect on an employee’s retirement date. 8th Pay Commission: Check Where Panel Will Hold Meetings Across States in October 2026.
Under AIDEF's proposal, the 8th Pay Commission would recalibrate pensions based on several structural parameters:
- The specific post or pay level held at retirement.
- Corresponding revised pay matrices established for that post in subsequent commissions.
- Increments and promotions actually earned during active service.
- Any post upgrades, reclassifications, or upward pay-level revisions enacted after the employee retired.
Employee bodies emphasize that if a post is upgraded after an employee’s departure, past retirees should not be permanently locked out of the higher baseline status. AIDEF has recommended setting standard civilian pensions at 50% of the resulting notional pensionable pay, subject to minimum pension floors.
Precedent and Background
The concept of pension parity across retirement eras is not entirely new to central pay panels. The 5th Central Pay Commission previously addressed inequities by recommending notional pay fixation for pre-1986 retirees and establishing that consolidated pensions should not fall below 50% of the minimum pay in the revised scale for the post held.
Similarly, the 7th Pay Commission recognized the principle of inter-temporal equity and endorsed progressively closing the gap between past and future pensioners.
As consultations for the 8th Pay Commission continue, the demand to institutionalize OROP for civilian employees remains one of the central issues submitted by unions seeking structural pension reforms.
(The above story first appeared on LatestLY on Sep 26, 2026 04:35 PM IST. For more news and updates on politics, world, sports, entertainment and lifestyle, log on to our website latestly.com).
