National Pension System (NPS): Are you an NPS account holder, wondering if your investments are actually making money or not? Here is some help for you. NPS is one of the few retirement products that allows you to generate a retirement corpus throughout your working years. Being market-linked, the potential of getting more returns is always there even as there are some risks. NPS is basically a pension-cum-investment scheme run by the Government of India. It is regulated by the government's Pension Fund Regulatory and Development Authority (PFRDA). NPS comes across as an attractive long-term saving option to help you effectively plan post-retirement financials through the safe and regulated market-based return. 

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You can check the rate at which your investments are growing on the official website of National Pension System Trust (http://www.npstrust.org.in). The trust has been established by PFRDA and it is the registered owner of all assets under NPS. Here's a look at how the returns of NPS Scheme - E Tier -1 has been till May 17, 2019. 

Scheme E Tier-I
 Pension Fund   AUM (Rs Crs) Returns 1 Year Returns 3 Years Returns 5 Years
Birla Sun Life Pension Management Ltd.   47.92 2.87% NA NA
HDFC Pension Management Co. Ltd.   2,174.73 4.81% 14.20% 10.90%
ICICI Pru. Pension Fund Mgmt Co. Ltd.   1,377.02 5.19% 12.71% 10.19%
Kotak Mahindra Pension Fund Ltd.   275.52 3.50% 12.38% 10.12%
LIC Pension Fund Ltd.   558.98 3.24% 11.45% 9.29%
Reliance Capital Pension Fund Ltd.   99.55 4.39% 11.53% 9.40%
SBI Pension Funds Pvt. Ltd   2,443.19 5.62% 13.21% 10.46%
UTI Retirement Solutions Ltd.   378.54 3.63% 12.89% 10.85%

*Source: National Pension System Trust

The NPS Scheme E - TIER I invests predominantly in the Equity and is meant for Tier-1 account holders. Under the NPS, subscribers get two accounts - Tier 1 and Tier II. While the Tier-I account is mandatory for all investors, the Tier-II account is optional. 

The NPS providers private sector subscribers the option chose from the eight official fund managers (see names in the chart above). Recently, this facility was also made available to the government sector NPS account holders. 

On subscribing to NPS, you are allocated a Permanent Retirement Account Number (PRAN). You will also receive an email alert as well as an SMS alert on your registered email ID and mobile number from by NSDL-CRA (Central Record Keeping Agency) after the PRAN has been registered. NPS subscribers can contribute periodically and regularly towards during their working years to create a retirement corpus.