Subscribers under PFRDA schemes increase 22 percent to 5.07 crore in Feb

The number of subscribers under two flagship pension schemes by PFRDA jumped 22 percent year-on-year to more than 5.07 crore by the end of February, according to data from the Pension Fund Regulatory and Development Authority (PFRDA).

"The number of subscribers in various schemes under the national pension system (NPS) rose to 507.23 lakh by the end of February 2022, from 414.70 lakh in February 2021, showing a year-on-year increase of 22.31 percent," the PFRDA said in a statement on Thursday.

The total assets under management (AUM) of the two schemes -- NPS and the Atal Pension Yojana (APY) -- rose 28.21 percent to Rs 7,17,467 crore.

In a break-up, the PFRDA said the central government employees under NPS witnessed nearly five per cent yearly growth in the subscriber base to 22.75 lakh at the end of February 2022. State government employees' count under the scheme rose by 9.22 percent to 55.44 lakh.

In the corporate sector, NPS' subscription base jumped 25 percent to 13.80 lakh and in the all-citizen model of the scheme, there was a spurt of 37.70 percent to 21.33 lakh.

The number of employees availing pension benefit under the NPS Lite model stood at 41.88 lakh by the end of February 2022. 

In this category, no fresh registration is permitted from April 1, 2015. NPA Lite was introduced from April 1, 2010, to serve customers belonging to the economically disadvantaged segment.

The APY registered over 29 percent jump in subscription to 3.52 crore by February-end, showed the data from the PFRDA.

NPS and APY are the two pension schemes administered by the PFRDA. NPS, which mainly caters to organised sector employees, is segmented into central government, state government, corporate sector employees, all-citizens model and NPS Lite. 

APY mainly caters to the unorganised sector workers for their pension needs.