Summary of this article
Kerala raises employee DA and pensioner DR to 37 per cent.
The increased allowance will be payable from November 2026.
Separate orders will be issued for arrears.
The Keralam government announced a 2 percentage point increase in the dearness allowance (DA) for employees and dearness relief (DR) for pensioners on October 17, 2026. Following the increase, the DA and DR will increase from 35 per cent to 37 per cent.
The government said in a notification, “The rates of Dearness Allowance payable to State Government Employees, Teachers, Staff of Aided Schools, Private Colleges and Polytechnics, Full-time contingent employees and Employees of Local Governments and the Dearness Relief payable to State Service Pensioners, Family Pensioners, Ex-gratia Pensioners and Ex-gratia Family Pensioners will be enhanced from the existing 35 per cent to 37 per cent.”
Employees will receive the DA with their October salary, payable in November. For the pensioners, the hiked DR will be paid along with the November 2026 pension, payable in November.
Notably, the salary and pension payment in November will only include the monthly hike in DA and DR, not the arrears. “Orders regarding arrears with effect from 01.01.2026 will be issued separately,” reads the notification.
According to the order, the hike will also apply to the part-time teachers and part-time contingent employees based on the pay they draw, to the re-employed pensioners, employees and pensioners of the state public sector undertaking, autonomous bodies, statutory corporations, boards, and the grant-in-aid institutions, based on their DA and DR patterns and the other specified conditions.
The additional expenditure in respect of local government will be met by these bodies from their own funds, reads the order.
So, such statutory bodies and organisations can follow the revised rates based on the decision of their respective governing bodies and the ability to meet the expenses themselves.
If they are unable to meet the expenses from their funds, they will be required to seek prior approval from the government to hike the rates. However, prior approval will not be required for those organisations whose 90 per cent of salary and pension expenditure is met through the government’s plan or non-plan grants.
Also, the DA and DR hike will not automatically apply to organisations that have been instructed to issue separate orders regarding the DA and DR hike, such as the Kerala State Electricity Board (KSEB) and the Kerala State Road Transport Corporation (KSRTC).
In a separate order on the same date, the government announced a 2 per cent DA hike for teaching staff coming under the University Grants Commission (UGC), All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE), and Medical Education Schemes.
The notification said, “Government is pleased to order that the rates of Dearness Allowance payable in respect of the teaching staff coming under UGC/AICTE/Medical Education Schemes who have changed over to revised UGC/AICTE/Medical Education scale from 01.01.2016 or thereafter will be enhanced from the existing 58 per cent to 60 per cent.”
The same 2 per cent hike is applicable to the DR for UGC pensioners and family pensioners whose salary scale has been revised in 2016 or after. Those pensioners whose pension has not been revised under the 2016 order will get a 5 per cent hike from the current 257 per cent to 262 per cent.
