Sunday, March 20 2005 13:11 Hrs (IST) - World Time -

New Delhi: A meeting of the Employees Provident Fund (EPF) Board, scheduled to be held today (Mar 20, 2005) to decide ways to cover the estimated shortfall of Rs 927 crore due to hiked interest rate for this year (2005), has been postponed.

Official sources said that the meeting, which was also to recommend the interest rate for the next fiscal (2006) for four crore subscribers, was postponed since an internal committee could not give its report in time on Employees Provident Fund Organisation's (EPFO) computerisation, the first item listed on the agenda of the meeting.

The internal committee, which was mandated to submit the report before March 20, 2005 would meet tomorrow (Mar 21, 2005) to find out reasons for the delay, official sources said.

Asked when the next meeting take place, they said the dates were yet to be finalised. Indications are that it could be held sometime in April.

A member of Central Board of Trustees (CBT) of the EPFO said that he got intimation about the postponement yesterday (Mar 19, 2005) night and was yet to know the reason for this.

Indications are that the CBT, which manages about Rs 1,28,000 crore of workers' savings, was waiting for a clear signal from the Finance Ministry on the status of Special Deposit Schemes (SDS), in which EPFO invests about 80 per cent of its assets, mainly for its recommendation for next year's interest rate.

"The only way to make EPFO sustainable is to increase the interest on SDS and allow reinvestment," Centre of Indian Trade Unions (CITU) secretary and a member of EPF Board, W R Wardharajan, said.

The Finance Ministry has ruled out subsidies of any form, asking the EPFO to find own ways to cover the Rs 927 crore estimated shortfall due to hike in EPF interest to 9.5 per cent for 2004-05.