Family pension

Family pension is the pension paid to the family of a central government employee or pensioner on their death, at 30% of the last pay at the ordinary rate and 50% at the enhanced rate, under Rule 50 of the Central Civil Services (Pension) Rules, 2021, notified as G.S.R. 868(E) on 20 December 2021. The ordinary rate is bounded by a minimum of Rs. 9,000 and a maximum of Rs. 75,000 a month, the enhanced rate by the same minimum and a maximum of Rs. 1,25,000, and dearness relief is paid on top, at 60% from 1 January 2026.

It is paid to one member of the family at a time, in the order Rule 50(6) fixes: the widow or widower, then the children below 25, then a disabled son or daughter for life, then an unmarried, widowed, or divorced daughter beyond 25 for life, then the dependent parents, and last the dependent disabled siblings. Entitlement is not a matter of nomination. The employee records the family in Form 4 on joining, but the rule, not the employee, decides who draws the pension and for how long.

Most of the difficulty in family pension lies in the conditions attached to each category rather than in the rate. A son loses the pension at 25, on marriage, or on earning above a ceiling; a daughter can hold it for life if she is unmarried, widowed, or divorced; a disabled child holds it for life but only after the younger children have aged out; a widow loses it on remarriage unless she is childless. The income ceiling itself is not one figure but two, and the higher one applies to disability cases.

This article sets out the two rates and the ceilings on each, the one-year service condition in Rule 50(1), the enhanced period and the two provisos that bound it, the order of entitlement category by category, the income test, the two-pension cases, dearness relief and the additional family pension after 80, the tax treatment under Section 93(1)(d), the claim procedure, the missing-employee provision in Rule 51, the murder-charge disqualification, the option a female employee has to place her children ahead of her husband, and how the benefit works under the National Pension System and the Unified Pension Scheme.

The ordinary and enhanced rates

The ordinary family pension is 30% of the last pay, subject to a minimum of Rs. 9,000 and a maximum of Rs. 75,000 a month, under Rule 50(2)(a)(i) of the CCS (Pension) Rules, 2021. The enhanced rate is 50% of the last pay, with the same Rs. 9,000 floor and a maximum of Rs. 1,25,000 a month under Rule 50(2)(a)(iv). Both ceilings are stated in the rule as rupee figures; they correspond to 30% and 50% of the highest pay in government of Rs. 2,50,000 a month.

Pay for this purpose is defined by Explanation 1 to Rule 50(2). It means the emoluments referred to in Rule 31, that is basic pay last drawn, or the average emoluments referred to in Rule 32, whichever is more. The dearness allowance the employee was drawing is not part of it; dearness relief is added to the family pension separately.

Rule 50(4) requires the family pension to be fixed at monthly rates in whole rupees, with any fraction rounded off to the next higher rupee. Where the pension is divided among more than one member and the rounding pushes the total past the ceiling, Rule 50(7)(b) requires the fraction to be ignored rather than the ceiling to be breached.

The enhanced rate is not an addition to the ordinary rate. It is the same family pension paid at a higher percentage for a defined window, after which Rule 50(2)(b) steps it down to the ordinary rate for the remainder of the entitlement, which for a widow is the rest of her life.

The service condition for entitlement

Family pension is payable only where the deceased had completed one year of continuous service, under Rule 50(1)(i). Two alternatives satisfy the condition instead. Rule 50(1)(ii) covers a death before that year is complete, provided the employee had been examined by the appropriate medical authority and declared fit for government service before appointment. Rule 50(1)(iii) covers a death after retirement where the deceased was drawing a pension or a compassionate allowance.

Continuous service is defined narrowly. The Explanation to Rule 50(1) excludes any period of suspension and any service rendered before the employee attained the age of 18, so a person appointed at 17 does not begin accruing the qualifying year until their eighteenth birthday.

The condition is separate from, and much lighter than, the qualifying service needed for a service pension. It also no longer carries the seven-year requirement that once governed the enhanced rate: until 1 October 2019 the enhanced 50% rate on death in service was payable only where the deceased had completed seven years of continuous service, and a Department of Pension and Pensioners’ Welfare notification dated 19 September 2019 removed it with effect from that date. Since then a person who dies in the second year of service leaves the family the enhanced rate for the full 10 years.

The enhanced rate and its ceilings

On death in service the enhanced rate of 50% of pay runs for 10 years from the day following the death, with no age limit, under Rule 50(2)(a)(ii). Nothing caps it except the Rs. 1,25,000 ceiling in Rule 50(2)(a)(iv).

On death after retirement the enhanced rate runs for seven years, or until the date on which the deceased would have attained 67 had they survived, whichever is less, under Rule 50(2)(a)(iii). Because superannuation is at 60, a retiree who dies at 64 leaves the family three years of the enhanced rate, not seven. The Department of Pension and Pensioners’ Welfare issued a clarification on the after-retirement enhanced rate in Office Memorandum No. 1/1(90)/2024-P&PW(E)-Part(1)/10344 dated 27 October 2025, after repeated references and right-to-information applications on the point. The age of 67 replaced 65 with effect from 1 October 2019.

Two provisos bound the after-retirement enhanced rate, and they cut in opposite directions. The first caps it: the enhanced family pension shall not exceed the pension authorised on retirement or dismissal. The second floors it: where the pension authorised was less than the ordinary family pension under Rule 50(2)(a)(i), the enhanced family pension is limited to the ordinary rate rather than falling below it.

The cap is less severe than it appears, and this is where families most often lose money they were entitled to. Explanation 2 to Rule 50(2) provides that the pension authorised on retirement includes the part of the pension the retiree had commuted before death. A pensioner who commuted 40% of the pension and was drawing a reduced figure is measured against the full unreduced pension, so commutation does not shrink the family pension. Explanation 3 extends the same treatment to a pension authorised on compulsory retirement and to a compassionate allowance sanctioned on dismissal or removal.

Worked examples

An employee dying in service on a last basic pay of Rs. 80,000 leaves a spouse an enhanced family pension of Rs. 40,000 a month for 10 years, then Rs. 24,000 a month for life. With dearness relief at 60% from 1 January 2026, the enhanced figure in hand is Rs. 64,000 a month and the ordinary figure Rs. 38,400. The 10 years run from the day following the death, and no age limit applies.

A pensioner who retired at 60 on a last basic pay of Rs. 80,000, was granted a pension of Rs. 40,000, commuted 40% of it, and died at 64 leaves a different picture. The enhanced family pension is 50% of pay, which is Rs. 40,000, and the cap is the pension authorised on retirement, which Explanation 2 reads as the full Rs. 40,000 rather than the reduced amount actually being drawn. So the spouse gets Rs. 40,000 a month, but only until the deceased would have turned 67, which is three years, and then Rs. 24,000 for life.

A third case shows the floor working. An employee dismissed from service and granted a compassionate allowance of Rs. 15,000 a month dies four years later, on a last pay of Rs. 80,000. The enhanced family pension under Rule 50(2)(a)(iii) would be capped at Rs. 15,000 by the first proviso, but the second proviso limits it to the ordinary rate under Rule 50(2)(a)(i) instead, which is Rs. 24,000. The family draws Rs. 24,000, not Rs. 15,000.

The family pension calculation article works through further combinations of rate and period, and the enhanced family pension article covers the enhanced window in full.

The order of entitlement

Rule 50(6) pays the family pension to one member of the family at a time, in a fixed order, so that when one claimant ceases to be eligible the pension passes to the next rather than being shared. Rule 50(7)(a) states the one-at-a-time rule and lists the clauses that displace it; Rule 50(7)(b) provides that where more than one member is entitled at the same time, the pension is paid in equal shares.

The place of the disabled child in this order is the point most often stated wrongly. Rule 50(9)(h) makes the family pension payable for life to a disabled son or daughter only where the deceased is not survived by a son or daughter below 25 who is eligible, or where such a child has died or ceased to be eligible. Rule 50(9)(h)(ii) is explicit: where the disabled child is one among two or more children, the family pension is paid first to the children below 25 in the order of birth until the last of them attains 25, and is then resumed in favour of the disabled child for life. The disabled child therefore ranks ahead of the daughters beyond 25, the parents, and the siblings, but behind the younger children.

Rule 50(6) also settles two questions of definition. The widow or widower expressly includes a post-retiral spouse, that is a person married after the employee retired, and a judicially separated wife or husband. Neither is excluded merely because the marriage came late or the couple had separated.

The spouse

The widow or widower draws the family pension up to the date of death or remarriage, whichever is earlier, under Rule 50(8)(a), and the eligibility of a widow or widower is not affected by the amount of their income from other sources. The spouse is the only category exempt from the income test that governs everyone else in the order.

Rule 50(8)(b) makes one exception to the remarriage bar. A childless widow keeps the family pension after remarriage so long as her income from all other sources is less than the minimum family pension plus the dearness relief admissible on it, which is Rs. 14,400 a month at 60% dearness relief. If her income later reaches or exceeds that figure the family pension stops and passes to the next eligible member. Rule 50(8)(k) puts her under a duty to certify once a year to the pension-disbursing authority that she has not started earning her livelihood.

A widow with children who remarries does not keep the family pension. The proviso to Rule 50(8)(e) provides that on her share ceasing to be payable it passes to her child or children, so the family is not left without the benefit, but she personally is out.

Where the deceased left more than one widow, Rule 50(8)(c) divides the family pension equally among them, and on the death or ineligibility of one widow her share passes to her own eligible children. Rule 50(8)(d) provides that a widow with no children does not see her share lapse: it goes to the other widows in equal shares, or in full to the sole other widow. Rules 50(8)(e), (f), and (g) extend the same share-preserving logic to children from a deceased wife, a divorced wife, and a void or voidable marriage respectively, each set of children taking the share their mother would have drawn. The family pension where there are two wives article covers the division and the question of who counts as a legally wedded widow, on which the Department of Pension and Pensioners’ Welfare issued a further clarification on 27 October 2025.

Judicial separation is dealt with separately. Under Rule 50(8)(h), where the deceased leaves a judicially separated spouse and no children, the family pension goes to the surviving spouse. Where there are minor children or children with a disorder or disability of mind, Rule 50(8)(i) pays the judicially separated spouse only while they are the guardian of those children, and pays the actual guardian otherwise.

Children below 25

A son is eligible while he is unmarried, below 25, and not earning his livelihood, under Rule 50(9)(a)(i). A daughter is eligible while she is unmarried, widowed, or divorced and not earning her livelihood, under Rule 50(9)(a)(ii). Both definitions expressly include an adopted child, a step child, and a child born after the retirement of the pensioner.

Rule 50(9)(d) pays the children below 25 first, in the order of their birth. Rule 50(9)(e) sets out the succession: the elder child draws it until attaining 25, marrying or remarrying, or starting to earn above the limit, whichever is earliest, and the next child becomes eligible when the elder above them reaches 25, marries, starts earning, or dies. Where the family pension is granted to a minor, Rule 50(9)(f) requires it to be paid through the guardian. Rule 50(9)(g) handles twins, paying them in equal shares, with the share of one reverting to the other when the first ceases to be eligible.

Two general stopping rules apply across the children. Rule 50(9)(n) makes an unmarried son, or an unmarried, widowed, or divorced daughter, ineligible from the date of marriage or remarriage, with a disabled son or daughter expressly excepted. Rule 50(9)(o) stops the family pension where the child starts earning a livelihood. Rule 50(9)(p) requires the child, or the guardian, to certify once a year to the pension-disbursing authority that they have not started earning and have not married or remarried.

Rules 50(9)(k), (l), and (m) govern children from more than one marriage. The unit of division is the mother, not the child: under Rule 50(9)(k) the eligible children of each mother take between them the share she would have received had she been alive, had she not been divorced, or had the marriage not been void or voidable, and Rule 50(9)(l) then pays that single share to those children in the manner sub-rule (9) specifies, one at a time in order of birth. Four children of one void marriage therefore hold one share, not four. A share ceasing to be payable does not lapse; it passes to the eligible children of the other mothers in equal shares. The family pension where there are two wives article works the arithmetic through.

A disabled son or daughter

A son or daughter suffering from a disorder or disability of mind, including intellectual disability, or physically disabled, or suffering from any other disability referred to in the Rights of Persons with Disabilities Act, 2016, so as to be unable to earn a living, draws the family pension for life beyond the age of 25, under Rule 50(9)(h). The entitlement takes effect after the children below 25 have ceased to be eligible, and it then continues without further age limit.

Four conditions attach. The disability must have existed before the death of the government servant or pensioner and their spouse. Where there is more than one disabled child, Rule 50(9)(h)(iii) pays them in order of birth rather than together. Rule 50(9)(h)(iv) requires payment through a guardian in the case of a disorder or disability of mind, but not for a physically disabled son or daughter who has attained majority. And Rule 50(9)(i) provides that marriage does not render a disabled child ineligible, which is the clearest departure from the treatment of every other child.

The disability must be certified before the family pension is allowed for life. Rule 50(9)(h)(v) requires a certificate from an authority competent to issue a disability certificate under the Rights of Persons with Disabilities Act, 2016 and the Rights of Persons with Disabilities Rules, 2017, or from a medical board comprising a Medical Superintendent, Principal, Director, or Head of the Institution, or their nominee, as Chairman and two other members, of whom at least one is a specialist in the particular area of disability, setting out as far as possible the exact mental or physical condition of the child. Rule 50(9)(h)(vi) then requires the certificate to be produced once only where the disability is permanent, and once every five years where it is temporary.

For a child with intellectual disability the family pension is paid to a person nominated by the employee or the pensioner, failing which to a person nominated later by the spouse, and Rule 50(9)(h)(vii) directs that a guardianship certificate issued under Section 14 of the National Trust Act, 1999 be accepted for that nomination in cases of autism, cerebral palsy, intellectual disability, and multiple disabilities. The family pension to a disabled child article covers the certification and guardianship machinery in full.

Unmarried, widowed, and divorced daughters

An unmarried, widowed, or divorced daughter draws the family pension beyond 25 for life, until she marries, remarries, or starts earning her livelihood, whichever is earliest, under Rule 50(9)(j). Her turn comes only after the children below 25 under Rule 50(9)(d) and any disabled child under Rule 50(9)(h) have died or ceased to be eligible; Rule 50(9)(j)(ii) states expressly that there must be no disabled child eligible.

Rule 50(9)(j)(iii) requires that she was dependent on her parent or parents while they were alive, so the entitlement rests on genuine dependency rather than on marital status alone. Where there is more than one such daughter, Rules 50(9)(j)(iv) and (v) pay them in order of birth, the younger becoming eligible when the elder marries, remarries, starts earning, or dies.

The timing of the widowhood or divorce decides eligibility. Rule 50(9)(j)(vi) requires that the death of the husband, or the divorce, took place during the lifetime of the government servant or pensioner or their spouse. The first proviso relaxes this for a divorce alone: the family pension is payable to a divorced daughter from the date of divorce where the divorce proceedings were filed in a competent court during the lifetime of the pensioner or the spouse but the decree came after their death. The Department of Pension and Pensioners’ Welfare confirmed this in Office Memorandum No. 1/1(1)/2022-P&PW(E) dated 26 October 2022. The second proviso adds that where the family pension had already become payable to another eligible member before the date of divorce, the divorced daughter’s turn does not begin until that member ceases to be eligible or dies. The family pension to a divorced and widowed daughter article covers these conditions in detail.

Dependent parents and disabled siblings

The dependent parents draw the family pension for life where the deceased is not survived by a spouse or any eligible child, or where all of them have ceased to be eligible, under Rule 50(10)(a). Rule 50(10)(b) pays the mother first and the father only on her failing. The Explanation treats parents as dependent where their combined income is less than the minimum family pension plus dearness relief, and Rule 50(10)(c) requires them to certify once a year that they have not started earning. The family pension to dependent parents article covers the dependency test.

Dependent siblings with a disability come last. Rule 50(11)(a) pays them for life where no spouse, child, or parent is eligible, and only where the siblings were wholly dependent on the deceased immediately before the death. Rule 50(11)(b) applies to them the same conditions and disability criteria as Rule 50(9)(h) and (i) apply to a disabled child, with a proviso that the disability existed before the death. Their income test is the same higher one that applies to a disabled child, and Rule 50(11)(c) imposes the same annual certificate.

The income test, category by category

The income ceiling is not a single figure. Rule 50(9)(b) applies one test to able-bodied children and Rule 50(9)(c) a different and higher one to a child with a disability, and the Explanation at the end of Rule 50(11) confirms the same split for siblings. Getting the two confused is the commonest error in a disability case, and it usually costs the claimant the pension.

The Rs. 14,400 figure is Rs. 9,000 plus dearness relief at 60% from 1 January 2026. It is not a fixed rupee amount: it rises every time dearness relief is revised, so a claimant near the line moves back under it at the next revision.

The disability ceiling is computed on the individual case and is usually much higher. For a deceased employee whose last pay was Rs. 80,000, the entitled ordinary family pension is Rs. 24,000, and with dearness relief at 60% the disabled child’s income ceiling is Rs. 38,400 a month, against Rs. 14,400 for a sibling without a disability in the same family.

Two family pensions at once

Two family pensions are payable to the same person where both the husband and the wife were government servants and both have died, under Rule 50(13). On the first death the family pension goes to the surviving spouse in the ordinary way; on the second, the surviving children are granted two family pensions, one for each parent. The combined amount is limited to Rs. 1,25,000 a month where either pension is at the enhanced rate, and to Rs. 75,000 a month where both are at the ordinary rate.

Rule 50(12)(a) makes the arrangement work: a family pension is not counted as income when deciding eligibility for a second family pension on the death of another government servant, subject to the combined ceiling. Without that provision the first pension would push the claimant over the income limit and defeat the second.

The disclosure obligations are specific. Rule 50(12)(c) requires a claimant to state in Form 10 whether they already draw a family pension for another government servant and, if so, how much. Rule 50(14)(a) requires a child to state whether they are eligible for another family pension for the other parent. The Head of Office is required by Rules 50(12)(d) and 50(14)(b) to take that information into account and keep the total inside the ceiling.

A different combination is always allowed and is not subject to this ceiling. Rule 50(5)(c) provides that the family pension under this rule is not limited by reference to a family pension admissible for the same person’s service in any other organisation, including the armed forces, which is the basis on which a military and a civil family pension are drawn together. A person drawing their own service pension may likewise draw a family pension alongside it. The dual family pension article separates the cases.

Dearness relief and the additional family pension at 80

Dearness relief is paid on the family pension and revised twice a year in step with the dearness allowance of serving employees. The rate is 60% from 1 January 2026, under Department of Expenditure Office Memorandum No. 1/1(i)/2026-E.II(B) dated 22 April 2026, so an ordinary family pension of Rs. 24,000 is Rs. 38,400 in hand.

The additional family pension after 80 is a separate increase, under Rule 50(3)(a). It is 20% of the basic family pension from 80 to below 85, 30% from 85 to below 90, 40% from 90 to below 95, 50% from 95 to below 100, and 100% at 100 or more, so a family pensioner who reaches 100 has the basic family pension doubled. Dearness relief is paid on the enhanced amount.

Rule 50(3)(b) makes the additional family pension payable from the first day of the calendar month in which it falls due, and the illustration to the rule settles the edge case: a family pensioner born on 20 August 1942 and one born on 1 August 1942 both draw the additional 20% from 1 August 2022. The additional pension in old age article covers the slabs and the age reckoning; the pensioner’s own additional quantum is under Rule 44(6) and the family pensioner’s under Rule 50(3).

Tax treatment

Family pension is taxable in the recipient’s hands as income from other sources, not as salary, so the standard deduction that applies to a retiree’s own pension does not apply to it. Section 93(1)(d) of the Income-tax Act, 2025, which took effect on 1 April 2026, allows instead a deduction of one-third of the family pension, capped at Rs. 25,000 where tax is computed under the new regime in Section 202(1) and Rs. 15,000 under the old regime. The same deduction stood in Section 57(iia) of the Income-tax Act, 1961 for income earned up to 31 March 2026, and the Finance Act 2024 was what raised the new-regime cap from Rs. 15,000 to Rs. 25,000.

The one-third is computed before the cap bites. A family pension of Rs. 38,400 a month is Rs. 4,60,800 a year, one-third of which is Rs. 1,53,600, so the deduction is the capped Rs. 25,000 under the new regime. The cap therefore governs every family pension above Rs. 75,000 a year, which is almost all of them, and the one-third only governs a very small family pension.

Applying the salary standard deduction to a family pension is a common error and it is not a small one: it substitutes Rs. 75,000 for Rs. 25,000. The minimum family pension of Rs. 9,000 and the dearness relief on it are both part of the taxable family pension. The deductions allowed in the new tax regime article lists Section 57(iia) among the short list that survives there, and the income tax for pensioners article covers the wider treatment.

Claiming family pension

Where the spouse is already co-authorised in the Pension Payment Order, the family pension starts to the spouse on the pensioner’s death with no fresh sanction. Rule 79(2)(a)(i) makes it payable from the day following the date of death, and Rule 79(2)(a)(ii) requires the pension-disbursing authority to begin disbursement within one month of receiving three documents: a claim in Form 12, a copy of the death certificate, and an undertaking to the bank in Format 9. The same one-month rule applies under Rule 79(2)(a)(iii) to a permanently disabled child, dependent parents or disabled siblings already named in the order. That co-authorisation is done at the time of the employee’s own retirement, which is what makes the automatic start possible. The PPO and the annual life certificate article covers the document.

Any other claimant applies afresh. Rule 50(12)(c) and Rule 50(14)(a) both refer to Form 10 as the claim form. Rule 50(12)(b) sets the income proof: a member of the family other than the widow or widower must submit, with the claim, a copy of the last income tax return filed with the Income Tax Department; failing that, a certificate of income from a sub-divisional magistrate; and failing both, any other document the Head of Office is prepared to rely on.

The record on which all of this runs is Form 4. Rule 50(15)(a) requires an employee to give details of the family in Form 4 to the Head of Office as soon as they enter service, covering the spouse, all children, the parents, and disabled siblings, whether or not each is currently eligible. Rule 50(15)(b) requires any change in the size of the family, including the marriage of a child, to be communicated. Rule 50(15)(f) requires a marriage, remarriage, or birth of a child after retirement to be intimated in Form 5 with the certificate. Rule 50(15)(e) requires the up-to-date family details to be submitted again with the pension papers before retirement.

Rule 50(15)(i) is the safeguard that matters most to a family in difficulty: a claim shall not be rejected on the ground that the member’s details do not appear in Form 4 or in the office records, where the Head of Office is otherwise satisfied about eligibility. An omission by the employee decades earlier does not defeat a genuine claim. Pension papers are processed through the Bhavishya system, and the central government pension article sets out the sanction machinery.

Where an employee or pensioner goes missing

Rule 51 pays the family pension where a government servant, a pensioner, or a family pensioner goes missing, at the rates in Rule 50(2) and subject to the same eligibility conditions that would apply on death. The family does not have to wait on a presumption of death.

The family pension accrues from the latest of three dates in the case of a serving employee: the day following the date up to which leave was sanctioned before the disappearance, the date up to which pay and allowances were paid, or the date a report was lodged with the police station as a First Information Report, a Daily Diary Entry, or a General Diary Entry. For a missing pensioner or family pensioner, Rules 51(2)(b) and 51(3)(b) run it from the day after the pension was last paid, or the date of the police report, whichever is later.

Rule 51(5) requires the claim to be submitted to the Head of Office after the police report is lodged, accompanied by an Indemnity Bond in Format 8, a copy of the report, and a report from the police that the person could not be traced despite all efforts. Rule 51(8)(a) then holds payment, including the arrears, until six months have passed from the date the report was lodged. Rule 51(4) makes the retirement gratuity payable on the same footing, and the death gratuity article covers the gratuity side.

Rule 51(6) fixes the pay on which the family pension is computed: the pay on the last date the employee was on duty before going missing, or, if on leave, the date the sanctioned leave expired.

Disqualification on a murder charge

A person charged with murdering the government servant, or with abetting the murder, is not paid the family pension until the criminal proceedings conclude, under Rule 50(14)(c). The Explanation to the sub-rule extends the charge to abetting death by suicide. Rule 50(14)(f) applies the same bar where the death came after retirement.

During that period the family pension is paid to another eligible member of the family from the date following the death, under Rule 50(14)(d). Where the spouse is the person charged and the other eligible member is a minor child, the proviso requires the family pension to be paid to the minor through a duly appointed guardian, and expressly bars the mother or father of the minor from acting as that guardian.

The outcome of the trial decides the rest. On conviction, Rule 50(14)(e)(i) debars the person from the family pension permanently and continues it to the other eligible member. On acquittal, Rule 50(14)(e)(ii) makes the family pension payable to the acquitted person from the date of acquittal and stops the other member’s from that date; where there was no other eligible member, or theirs had already ceased, the acquitted person is paid from the day following the death instead.

A female employee’s option to nominate her children

A female government servant or pensioner may ask for the family pension to go to her eligible child or children in precedence to her husband, where divorce proceedings are pending in a competent court, or where she has filed a case against her husband under the Protection of Women from Domestic Violence Act, 2005, the Dowry Prohibition Act, 1961, or the Indian Penal Code. The Department of Pension and Pensioners’ Welfare directed this in Office Memorandum No. 1/1(1)/2023-P&PW(E) dated 1 January 2024, after consulting the Ministry of Women and Child Development, and stated that a formal amendment to Rule 50 would be notified separately.

The request is made in writing to the Head of Office and it operates only on her death during the pendency of those proceedings. It does not disinherit the husband outright. Where she is survived by a widower and children who have attained majority but remain eligible, the family pension is paid to those children; after all the children cease to be eligible it becomes payable to the widower until his death or remarriage, whichever is earlier. Where the widower is the guardian of a minor child or a child with a disorder or disability of mind, the family pension is paid to him for as long as he remains the guardian.

Where the female employee dies leaving no children, or leaving children who are not eligible, the family pension goes to the widower in the ordinary way under Rule 50(8). The option changes the order of entitlement; it does not remove the husband from it.

Family pension under NPS and the Unified Pension Scheme

The defined-benefit family pension in Rule 50 applies to employees appointed on or before 31 December 2003, that is the cohort on the Old Pension Scheme. The 2021 Rules do not cover employees appointed on or after 1 January 2004, and the family benefit for them is settled elsewhere.

Under the National Pension System, what the family receives on death in service turns on the option the employee filed, not on the family’s choice after the death. Rule 10 of the Central Civil Services (Implementation of National Pension System) Rules, 2021 requires every NPS-covered employee to exercise an option in Form 1: either the benefits under the CCS pension rules, meaning the family pension described in this article, or the benefits of the accumulated NPS corpus. The option is the employee’s and cannot be made by the family afterwards. Where no option was filed, the default under the 2021 Rules is the family pension for the first 15 years of service and the NPS benefit thereafter. The NPS exit and withdrawal rules article covers the corpus route.

Under the Unified Pension Scheme, regulation 16(1) of the PFRDA Regulations of 19 March 2025 gives the legally wedded spouse a family payout of 60% of the admissible payout the pensioner was drawing immediately before the death, for life, with dearness relief on top under regulation 17. The base is the admissible payout actually drawn, not the assured payout, so a final withdrawal that had reduced the pensioner’s own payout reduces the family payout in the same proportion.

Where the death or disablement is attributable to government service, the benefit does not come from Rule 50 at all. Rule 50(5)(a) bars a family pension under this rule while an award under the extraordinary pension rules is current, and Rule 50(5)(b) allows an ordinary family pension to be authorised in the meantime and replaced by a revised authority when the extraordinary award is decided. The extraordinary pension and disability and invalid pension articles cover that route.

Related Articles

• Enhanced family pension
• Family pension calculation
• Family pension to a disabled child
• Family pension to a divorced and widowed daughter
• Family pension to dependent parents
• Family pension where there are two wives
• Dual family pension
• Death gratuity
• Additional pension in old age
• CCS (Pension) Rules, 2021
• Fixed Medical Allowance
• NPS exit and withdrawal rules
• Disability and invalid pension
• Extraordinary pension
• Income tax for pensioners
• Deductions allowed in the new tax regime
• PPO and the annual life certificate
• Bhavishya pension processing system
• Qualifying service
• TDS on salary (Section 192)
• Superannuation
• Restoration of commuted pension
• Department of Pension and Pensioners’ Welfare
• Central government pension
• Old Pension Scheme
• National Pension System
• Unified Pension Scheme
• Commutation of pension
• Gratuity for central government employees
• Dearness relief
• Dearness allowance
• 7th Central Pay Commission
• 8th Central Pay Commission
• Central government employees in India
• Pay matrix
• Minimum pay
• Pay fixation
• House rent allowance
• Income tax for government employees
• Standard deduction
• Take-home salary of central government employees
• Department of Personnel and Training
• Department of Expenditure
• Central Administrative Tribunal
• 7th CPC salary calculator

External references

• Department of Pension and Pensioners’ Welfare
• CCS (Pension) Rules, 2021, full text
• A Handbook on Family Pension
• Pensioners’ Portal, pension rules
• Central Pension Accounting Office
• Income Tax Department

References

1. Central Civil Services (Pension) Rules, 2021, notified as G.S.R. 868(E) on 20 December 2021, Rule 50: sub-rule (1) (service condition), sub-rule (2) (ordinary and enhanced rates, ceilings, and Explanations 1 to 3), sub-rule (3) (additional family pension after 80), sub-rule (4) (rounding), sub-rule (5) (extraordinary pension and other service), sub-rule (6) (order of entitlement), sub-rule (7) (one member at a time and equal shares), sub-rule (8) (widow or widower, remarriage, childless widow, more than one widow, judicial separation), sub-rule (9) (children, disabled child, unmarried, widowed, and divorced daughters, income test, annual certificates), sub-rule (10) (dependent parents), sub-rule (11) (dependent disabled siblings), sub-rule (12) (second family pension not counted as income, income proof, Form 10), sub-rule (13) (two family pensions and the combined ceilings), sub-rule (14) (disclosure and the murder-charge bar), and sub-rule (15) (Form 4, Form 5, and the safeguard against rejection).
2. Central Civil Services (Pension) Rules, 2021, Rule 51, entitlements of the family of a missing government servant, pensioner, or family pensioner, including the Indemnity Bond in Format 8 and the six-month period before payment.
3. Central Civil Services (Pension) Rules, 2021, Rules 31 and 32, emoluments and average emoluments, applied to family pension by Explanation 1 to Rule 50(2).
4. Department of Pension and Pensioners’ Welfare, Office Memorandum No. 1/1(1)/2022-P&PW(E), dated 26 October 2022, on family pension to an unmarried, widowed, or divorced daughter and on continuance of family pension on remarriage of a childless widow.
5. Department of Pension and Pensioners’ Welfare, Office Memorandum No. 1/1(90)/2024-P&PW(E)-Part(1)/10344, dated 27 October 2025, clarifying the enhanced rate of family pension in the case of death after retirement.
6. Department of Pension and Pensioners’ Welfare, Office Memorandum No. 1/1(1)/2023-P&PW(E), dated 1 January 2024, allowing a female government servant or pensioner to seek grant of family pension to her eligible child or children in precedence to her husband.
7. Department of Pension and Pensioners’ Welfare notification dated 19 September 2019, effective 1 October 2019, removing the requirement of seven years of continuous service for the enhanced family pension on death in service and raising the after-retirement age limit from 65 to 67.
8. Income-tax Act, 2025 (Act No. 30 of 2025), in force from 1 April 2026, Section 93(1)(d), deduction of one-third of the family pension subject to Rs. 25,000 where tax is computed under the new regime in Section 202(1) and Rs. 15,000 under the old regime; formerly Section 57(iia) of the Income-tax Act, 1961, whose new-regime cap the Finance Act 2024 raised from Rs. 15,000 to Rs. 25,000.
9. Central Civil Services (Implementation of National Pension System) Rules, 2021, Rule 10, option in Form 1 between the benefits under the CCS pension rules and the accumulated NPS corpus.
10. PFRDA (Operationalisation of Unified Pension Scheme under National Pension System) Regulations, 2025, notified 19 March 2025, regulation 16(1) (family payout of 60% of the admissible payout) and regulation 17 (dearness relief).
11. Department of Expenditure, Office Memorandum No. 1/1(i)/2026-E.II(B), dated 22 April 2026, dearness allowance and dearness relief at 60% with effect from 1 January 2026.