Dearness allowance hike announced for bank employees for February, March and April; check details

The Indian Banks' Association (IBA) has announced the revised dearness allowance (DA) rate for various bank employees for February, march and April 2026. It has also announced the revised and dearness relief (DR) for pensioners for February to July 2026.

The following are the details of the revised DA/DR rates:

The rate of DA will be 25%, which is around 4% higher than the dearness allowance rates for the months of August, September and October 2025.

"...the rate of Dearness Allowance payable to Workmen and Officer employees for the months of February, March and April 2026 shall be 25% of `pay' (0.01% change in DA on 'pay' for change in every second decimal place of CPI 2016 over 123.03 points)," IBA said in a circular dated February 2, 2026.

The above is based on the Consumer Price Index for October, November and December 2025.

"The average CPI of the above is 148.03 and accordingly the number of points over 123.03 are 25.00 (148.03 - 123.03). The last average quarterly CPI was 146.96. Hence, there is an increase of 1.07 points for February, March and April 2026," IBA said.

DA will be 59.08% of pay.

"... the rate of Dearness Allowance payable to Workmen and Officer employees for the months of February, March and April 2026 shall be 59.08% of `pay'. While arriving at dearness allowance payable, decimals from third place may please be ignored," the IBA said.

The following rates of DR will apply for different retirees:

Dearness Relief to pensioners who retired on or after 1st day of January,1986, but before the 1st day of November 1992/1st July, 1993: 1528.94% of basic pension

Dearness Relief to pensioners who retired on or after 1st day of November 1992/1st July, 1993: 750.75% of basic pension

Dearness Relief to pensioners who retired on or after 1st day of April, 1998: 482% of basic pension

Dearness Relief to pensioners who retired on or after 1st day of November 2002: 334.80% of basic pension

Dearness Relief to pensioners who retired on or after 1st day of November, 2007: 258.45 % of basic pension

Dearness Relief to pensioners who retired on or after 1st day of November, 2012: 132.20% of basic pension

Dearness Relief to pensioners who retired on or after 1st day of November, 2017: 59.08 % of basic pension

Dearness Relief to pensioners who retired on or after 1st day of November, 2022: 25 % of basic pension