Loco Pilot salary

A Loco Pilot on the Indian Railways is paid at Level 6 of the 7th CPC pay matrix, entry basic Rs. 35,400, and an Assistant Loco Pilot enters the cadre at Level 2, initial pay Rs. 19,900. The pay level is only half the figure. Two Railway Board orders do the rest of the work: the order of 20 March 2026 fixes the Kilometreage Allowance at Rs. 430 to Rs. 606 per 100 kilometres run by grade, and RBE No. 85/2019 reckons 30% of basic pay as a pay element, so the dearness allowance, the house rent allowance and the National Pension System contribution are all computed on 1.30 times basic rather than on basic alone.

The combined effect is that a running-staff member earns materially more than a stationary railway servant on the identical pay level. At 60% dearness allowance and an X-class city posting, a Loco Pilot (Goods) at the entry cell of Level 6 grosses close to Rs. 96,000 a month on a 3,000 kilometre running month, against roughly Rs. 66,000 for a non-running Level 6 employee on the same basic pay. The gap is the kilometreage allowance plus the allowances the pay element inflates.

The pay is also variable in a way no other central government salary is. Kilometreage is earned on the distance actually run, so the same post pays differently from month to month depending on the diagrams worked, the rest days taken and the time spent on refresher courses or medical examinations. The fixed components, basic pay and the pay element, do not move; the variable component is the largest single line on the pay slip after dearness allowance.

The base pay at any level is worked out by the salary by pay level calculator, to which the running-staff components are added. For the allowance itself, treated on its own, see running allowance.

Assistant Loco Pilot: entry pay and in-hand

An Assistant Loco Pilot is appointed at Level 2 of the pay matrix with an initial pay of Rs. 19,900, as stated in the post table of Centralised Employment Notice CEN No. 01/2026 issued by the Railway Recruitment Boards. The post carries the A-1 medical standard and an age band of 18 to 30 years.

With the 30% pay element under RBE No. 85/2019, the pay reckoned for the standard allowances is Rs. 25,870. The table below is illustrative for an X-class city at the dearness allowance rate of 60% fixed by Department of Expenditure Office Memorandum No. 1/1(i)/2026-E.II(B) dated 22 April 2026, and assumes a running of 2,500 kilometres in the month.

The pay element is not a cash payment. It is a reckoning device: nothing labelled “pay element” appears on the pay slip, and the Rs. 5,970 it adds to the ALP’s notional pay shows up only through the larger dearness allowance and house rent allowance figures that flow from it. An ALP on the same basic pay who was not running staff would draw Rs. 11,940 of dearness allowance and Rs. 5,970 of house rent allowance instead, a difference of Rs. 5,373 a month before the kilometreage is even counted.

Because the kilometreage moves with the diagram, the in-hand moves with it. A month heavy with rest days, refresher courses or periodical medical examinations produces less kilometreage and a lower in-hand than a month of long-distance goods links. An ALP’s in-hand in an X-class city runs roughly Rs. 45,000 to Rs. 52,000 across ordinary months. There is no health-scheme deduction, because railway medical attendance is provided at railway hospitals rather than through a contributory scheme, as for any railway employee.

Loco Pilot grades and the pay level attaching to each

The grade-to-level mapping for loco running staff is stated in Railway Board letter No. E(GP)2019/2/25 dated 9 April 2026, which was issued to end divergent zonal practice in fixing the relative seniority of running staff against stationary staff for the 70% selection quota to Group B. Its equivalence matrix is the cleanest current statement of what each grade draws.

The three functional loco pilot grades sit at the same Level 6. Goods, Passenger and Mail or Express are separate seniority units under the 9 April 2026 order, but they are not separate pay levels, and a promotion from Loco Pilot (Goods) to Loco Pilot (Mail or Express) does not change the basic pay. What changes is the kilometreage rate and the Additional Allowance, and that is where the earnings gap between the goods link and the mail link comes from.

The same order equates a Loco Pilot (Goods), (Passenger) or (Mail or Express) in grade pay 4200 with stationary staff in grade pay 4600 for the purpose of the integrated Group C seniority list, while placing the Loco Pilot (Goods) en bloc below the other two functional grades and below stationary staff in Level 7. The equation is a seniority device, not a pay upgrade: it decides the order of names on a promotion list, and it leaves the running-staff member drawing Level 6.

Kilometreage Allowance: the current rates

The Kilometreage Allowance is the cash core of the running allowance, quoted as a rupee rate per 100 kilometres run on booked running duty. Railway Board letter No. E(P&A)II/2013/RS-14 (Part-2) dated 20 March 2026, S.No. PC-VII/232, revised the rates with effect from 1 January 2024, the date on which dearness allowance reached 50% and triggered the 25% enhancement the 7th CPC framework provides for this class of allowance.

The 2026 order supersedes the rates in Railway Board letter No. E(P&A)II-2013/RS-14 dated 28 May 2019, RBE No. 85/2019, which had settled the kilometreage rates that ran from 1 July 2017 to 31 December 2023. Because the revision took effect from 1 January 2024 and the order issued on 20 March 2026, it carried arrears for the intervening 26 months. The 2026 order also prices the assistant and shunting grades separately: a Senior Assistant Loco Pilot draws Rs. 447 per 100 kilometres against the Assistant Loco Pilot’s Rs. 430, and both drop to Rs. 287 and Rs. 277 respectively on shunting work.

Not every duty day covers kilometres. A loco pilot attending a periodical medical examination, a refresher course or a departmental enquiry, giving evidence in court on railway business or serving out joining time on transfer is on duty and earns nothing on the kilometreage table. For those days the Allowance in Lieu of Kilometreage is paid, at the pay element where the duty is at headquarters and at the notional rate of 160 kilometres a duty day where it is at an outstation. That is why the second column of the rate table is quoted per 160 km against the first column’s per 100 km: 160 kilometres is the standard notional run for a day of non-running duty.

The 1981 Running Allowance Rules also provide for light duty. Running staff travelling as passengers on duty before or after working a train, or called to work a train at an outstation and obliged to return without working it because the train was cancelled, are paid at half the kilometreage actually travelled.

The 30% and 55% pay element

Railway Board letter No. E(P&A)II-2013/RS-14 dated 28 May 2019, RBE No. 85/2019, fixes the pay element in two rates that apply to different purposes and never overlap.

For benefits other than retirement, 30% of basic pay is reckoned as pay. A Loco Pilot (Goods) on the Level 6 entry cell of Rs. 35,400 is treated for these purposes as drawing Rs. 46,020, so the dearness allowance, the house rent allowance and the National Pension System contribution are all computed on the larger figure. At 60% dearness allowance the difference is Rs. 6,372 a month on that head alone, and at 30% house rent allowance a further Rs. 3,186.

For pension, retirement gratuity and the commuted value of pension, the element is 55%. The retirement base becomes 1.55 times basic pay, which is the single largest financial advantage of a running career and the reason a running-staff member retires on a pension well above what the printed pay level suggests. For a Loco Inspector, a supervisory post outside the running cadre, only the 30% element survives and only for retirement benefits. Railway Board letter No. E(P&A)II-2015/RS-25 dated 13 November 2017 states that Loco Inspectors are entitled to the 30% add-on under paragraph 5.5 of Railway Board letter No. E(P&A)II/83/RS-10(iv) dated 25 November 1992, and that they are not classified as running staff and so are not entitled to the 55% element. They do keep the kilometreage for footplate duty, under rules 1514 and 1515 of the Indian Railway Establishment Code Volume II.

The 30% figure is not confined to Railway Board circulars. Rule 2(d)(I) of the Railway Servants (Hours of Work and Period of Rest) Rules, 2005 defines “ordinary rate of pay” to include the element of running allowance to the extent of 30% of basic pay in the case of running staff as defined in rule 1507 of the Indian Railway Establishment Code, Volume II. That definition is what carries the pay element into the overtime calculation under rule 10 of the same rules, so a running-staff member’s overtime hour is priced on 1.30 times basic as well.

The Additional Allowance

Railway Board letter No. PC-VII/2017/I/7/5/5 dated 10 August 2017, circulated as RBE No. 85/2017, pays a flat monthly Additional Allowance to the senior running grades with effect from 1 July 2017. It revised the rates for three categories that already drew it and extended it to two that did not.

Dearness allowance is payable on the Additional Allowance, so at 60% the Mail or Express loco pilot’s Rs. 2,250 is worth Rs. 3,600 a month in hand. The order states that it does not count for pensionary benefits, and that is the operative difference between the Additional Allowance and the pay element: one lifts the monthly pay slip and stops at retirement, the other follows the employee into the pension. The National Federation of Indian Railwaymen pressed for the Additional Allowance to be reckoned for retirement benefits by its letter No. IV/RSAC/Conf./Part.VIII dated 13 October 2017, and the position stated in RBE No. 85/2017 stands.

Between the kilometreage table and the Additional Allowance table, a Loco Pilot (Mail or Express) earns Rs. 12 more per 100 kilometres and Rs. 1,500 more a month in flat allowance than a Loco Pilot (Goods) on the identical Level 6 basic pay. That is the whole of the pay difference between the two grades.

Loco Pilot at Level 6: the in-hand

The illustration below takes a Loco Pilot (Goods) at the Level 6 entry cell of Rs. 35,400, posted in an X-class city, running 3,000 kilometres in the month, at the dearness allowance rate of 60% fixed by Department of Expenditure Office Memorandum No. 1/1(i)/2026-E.II(B) dated 22 April 2026.

A Loco Pilot (Mail or Express) on the same cell and the same 3,000 kilometres grosses about Rs. 98,600, the difference being Rs. 360 of extra kilometreage and Rs. 2,400 of extra Additional Allowance with dearness allowance on it. A loco pilot several increments into Level 6, or on a heavy running link covering 4,000 kilometres a month, crosses Rs. 1.1 lakh gross. The take-home salary of central government employees at the same level without the running components sits far below all of these figures.

Income tax is nil in the illustration because the annual gross of Rs. 11.5 lakh, reduced by the standard deduction of Rs. 75,000, falls under the Rs. 12 lakh total income up to which the new tax regime rebate makes the liability nil. A senior loco pilot on a higher cell, or one drawing heavier kilometreage, moves above that threshold and pays tax.

Allowances a loco pilot does not draw

Running duty is compensated through the kilometreage, and the outstation costs it is meant to meet are covered inside the same scheme rather than through a separate travelling allowance claim. The Rules for the Payment of Running and Other Allowances to the Running Staff on Railways, 1981, which came into force on 1 August 1981 and are reproduced as Chapter IX of the Indian Railway Establishment Manual Volume I, price the outstation elements themselves: rule 910 credits 70 kilometres for every 24 hours or part of it after the first 16 hours from signing off, and rule 908 pays an allowance in lieu of running room facilities at an outstation where no running room is provided and the rest between arrival and departure exceeds four hours.

Transport allowance is a different head, governed for railway servants by Railway Board order RBE No. 80/2017, and it meets the cost of commuting between residence and a fixed place of work rather than the cost of running duty. It is not admissible to an employee provided with the facility of government transport. A running-staff member should take the current position on transport allowance from the establishment rules applicable to the category, because the treatment turns on the specific duty pattern rather than on the pay level.

Night duty allowance is admissible for duty performed between 22:00 and 06:00 at an hourly rate of basic pay plus dearness allowance divided by 200, subject to a ceiling of Rs. 43,600 of basic pay for entitlement. An Assistant Loco Pilot at Level 2 is comfortably inside that ceiling for the whole of the level. A Loco Pilot at Level 6 reaches Rs. 43,600 at the eighth cell and Rs. 44,900 at the ninth, so the entitlement lapses after roughly eight annual increments in the level. Overtime allowance is separately available under rule 10 of the 2005 rules, at one and a half times the ordinary rate between the rostered hours and the Section 132 limits and at twice the ordinary rate beyond them.

Hours of work, rest and overtime

Loco pilots are classified as continuous employment for the purposes of the Railway Servants (Hours of Work and Period of Rest) Rules, 2005, made under Section 136 of the Railways Act, 1989. Rule 8(3)(b) fixes 48 standard hours a week for that classification. Rule 8(7) deems the preparatory and complementary work of running staff to be 4 hours a week, so the rostered week for running staff is 52 hours. Section 132(2) of the Railways Act, 1989 caps a continuous-classification railway servant at 54 hours a week on an average in a two-weekly period of fourteen days, and rule 10(2)(i) applies the averaging principle to running staff, so the two-week average rather than any single week is what governs.

Rest is governed by rule 12. Sub-rule (1) gives a continuous-classification railway servant not less than 30 consecutive hours of rest every week commencing on a Sunday. Sub-rule (2) bars calling a continuous-classification servant on duty without at least 10 consecutive hours of rest after the previous tour of duty. Sub-rule (3) is the running-staff provision: each month, either at least five rest periods of not less than 22 consecutive hours each, or at least four periods of not less than 30 consecutive hours each including a full night, with the hours of work counted from signing on to signing off. Sub-rule (4) adds that running staff shall not normally be away from headquarters for more than three or four days at a stretch, that periodic rest shall be given at headquarters, that rest at headquarters shall always include a night in bed, and that it should as far as possible be once in every ten days.

The signing-on to signing-off measure matters financially as well as physically, because it is the same measure the kilometreage and the Allowance in Lieu of Kilometreage are computed against under the 1981 rules. Duty that produces no kilometres still produces hours, and those hours count towards both the rostered week and the rest entitlement.

Overtime under rule 10 is priced on the “ordinary rate of pay” defined in rule 2(d), which for running staff includes the 30% pay element along with dearness allowance and any compensatory city allowance. Rule 11 requires every hour of extra work beyond the rostered hours to be entered in a register in Form A maintained by an officer authorised by the Head of the Railway Administration, which is the documentary basis on which an overtime claim is settled.

Recruitment through the Railway Recruitment Boards

An Assistant Loco Pilot is recruited by the Railway Recruitment Boards under a Centralised Employment Notice. CEN No. 01/2026 notified 11,127 vacancies across all participating boards, with the post at Level 2, initial pay Rs. 19,900, medical standard A-1, and an age band of 18 to 30 years as on 1 July 2026. Applications closed on 14 June 2026.

The educational qualification marks the post out as technical. A candidate needs matriculation or SSLC plus an ITI from a recognised NCVT or SCVT institution in one of the notified trades, which include Fitter, Electrician, Instrument Mechanic, Millwright or Maintenance Mechanic, Electronics Mechanic, Mechanic (Motor Vehicle), Wireman, Mechanic (Diesel), Turner, Machinist and Refrigeration and Air-Conditioning Mechanic; or matriculation plus a Course Completed Act Apprenticeship in those trades; or matriculation plus a three-year diploma in Mechanical, Electrical, Electronics or Automobile Engineering in lieu of the ITI. A degree in those engineering disciplines is accepted in lieu of the diploma. Railway Group D posts, by contrast, need no trade qualification.

The recruitment runs five stages under paragraph 12 of the notice. The first computer-based test is a screening exercise of 75 questions in 60 minutes with negative marking at one third of a mark, and its marks are not counted in the final panel. The second computer-based test runs 2 hours 30 minutes over 175 questions, a 100-question Part A in 90 minutes covering mathematics, general intelligence and reasoning, and basic science and engineering, and a 75-question qualifying Part B in 60 minutes drawn from the trade syllabi prescribed by the Directorate General of Training, in which 35% is the pass mark for every candidate irrespective of community.

The third stage is the distinguishing one. The Computer Based Aptitude Test is compulsory for the Assistant Loco Pilot post and is set by the psychology wing of the Research Designs and Standards Organisation. Candidates equal to eight times the vacancies in each community are shortlisted for it on their Part A marks. It is conducted only in English and Hindi, carries no negative marking, and requires a minimum T-score of 42 in each test battery separately, so a strong overall score does not save a candidate who fails one battery. Under paragraph 12.4(a) the final merit list weights Part A of the second computer-based test and the aptitude test in the ratio of 50:50, a change from the 70:30 weighting used in the earlier cycle under CEN 01/2024.

Document verification and the medical examination close the process. The A-1 standard requires distant vision of 6/6 in each eye without glasses with the fogging test, near vision of Sn 0.6 in each eye without glasses, and passing tests for colour vision, binocular vision, field of vision, night vision and mesopic vision. A candidate who has undergone Lasik surgery or any other refractive-error correction is not eligible, and the notice states that the post is not suitable for a person with benchmark disability. The detailed standards are in Chapter 5 of the Indian Railway Medical Manual, Volume I.

Career progression and promotion

The cadre is entered at Assistant Loco Pilot and worked upward through the shunting grades to the functional loco pilot grades. Promotion from Level 2 carries the ordinary consequences of pay fixation on promotion, with one increment in the existing level followed by placement at the next cell in the higher level, and the annual increment falls due on 1 July or 1 January under the ordinary annual increment rules.

The pay jump on promotion is large in this cadre because the levels are far apart. Moving from Level 4, entry Rs. 25,500, to Level 6, entry Rs. 35,400, raises basic pay by Rs. 9,900, and the 30% pay element turns that into a reckoned increase of Rs. 12,870 for dearness and house rent allowance purposes. The kilometreage rate rises at the same time, from the Rs. 430 or Rs. 447 band to Rs. 594 or above.

Where functional promotion does not come, the Modified Assured Career Progression scheme provides financial upgradation on completing 10, 20 and 30 years of service without promotion. The Group B selection route runs through the integrated Group C seniority list governed by Railway Board letter No. E(GP)2019/2/25 dated 9 April 2026, which is why the equation of Level 6 running staff with Level 7 stationary staff for seniority purposes has practical value even though it changes no one’s pay.

Pension

A loco pilot appointed on or after 1 January 2004 is covered by the National Pension System, contributing 10% of pay plus dearness allowance against the government’s 14%, or by the Unified Pension Scheme where that option has been exercised. The Old Pension Scheme is closed to entrants after that date.

The running-staff advantage reaches the retirement benefit under every framework, through different limbs of RBE No. 85/2019. Under a defined-benefit computation, the 55% element makes the emoluments 1.55 times basic pay, so the pension, the retirement gratuity and the commuted value of pension are all worked out on that enlarged base. Under a contributory scheme, the 30% element enlarges the salary on which both the employee’s 10% and the employer’s 14% contributions are calculated, so the corpus accumulates faster than for a stationary employee on the same pay level.

For a Loco Pilot (Goods) at the Level 6 entry cell, the 55% element lifts the pensionary base from Rs. 35,400 to Rs. 54,870, and the 30% element lifts the monthly contribution base from Rs. 35,400 plus dearness allowance to Rs. 46,020 plus dearness allowance. The Additional Allowance does not enter either computation, because RBE No. 85/2017 excludes it from pensionary benefits. For the mechanics of the pension itself see central government pension and, for the commuted portion, commutation of pension.

Income tax

The kilometreage allowance, the Additional Allowance and the dearness and house rent allowances computed on the pay element are all salary and taxable as such. The statute changed on 1 April 2026, when the Income-tax Act, 2025 replaced the Income-tax Act, 1961 and the Income-tax Rules, 2026 replaced the Rules of 1962, the latter notified by Central Board of Direct Taxes Notification No. 22/2026, G.S.R. 198(E), dated 20 March 2026.

The exemption a loco pilot has to look at is 70% of the allowance, subject to Rs. 25,000 a month, at serial 6 of the table under rule 280(2) of the Income-tax Rules, 2026. That is the prescribed extent for serial 13 of the Table in Schedule III to the Income-tax Act, 2025, the limb covering an allowance granted to an employee of a transport undertaking to meet personal expenditure during duty performed in the course of running such transport, and it is conditioned on the employee not receiving a daily allowance for the same duty. The cap was rebased in the 2026 notification: under Rule 2BB(2) of the Income-tax Rules, 1962 it had been 70% capped at Rs. 10,000 a month.

The exemption is available only in the old regime. Section 202(2)(a)(ii) of the Income-tax Act, 2025 disapplies serials 12 and 13 of the Schedule III Table other than to the extent prescribed, and the survivors prescribed by rule 280(3) are the items in rule 280(1)(a) to (d) together with serial 10 of rule 280(2). Serial 6 is not among them, so a loco pilot with a large kilometreage earning is one of the cases where the old regime can still be the better of the two.

Section 202 of the Income-tax Act, 2025 governs the default regime, and it removes the great majority of prescribed-allowance exemptions for anyone taxed under it, including the house rent allowance exemption. A loco pilot who wants an allowance exemption has to be in the old regime and has to compare it against the standard deduction and the rebate that the default regime offers instead. On the illustrative figures above, the default regime produces a nil liability at both Level 2 and the Level 6 entry cell, which makes the exemption question academic for the earlier part of the career.

Non-cash entitlements

Beyond pay, a loco pilot draws the benefits in kind that attach to railway service. Medical attendance is provided at railway hospitals and health units rather than through a contributory health scheme, so no health-scheme subscription is deducted from the pay slip. Privilege passes and privilege ticket orders provide free and concessional travel for the employee and the family, on a scale that rises with the pay level.

National holiday allowance is payable where duty is performed on a notified national holiday, which is common in a cadre that works round the clock. Running rooms are provided at outstations for rest between links, and an allowance in lieu is payable where the facility is not available. The 1981 rules also provide a Trip Allowance, a Shunting Allowance, a Ghat Allowance for the steeply graded sections, a Waiting Duty Allowance and an Officiating Allowance, each with its own conditions and its own revision cycle by Railway Board order.

What the 8th Central Pay Commission may change

Nothing has been decided. The 8th Central Pay Commission was constituted by Department of Expenditure Resolution F. No. 01-01/2025-E.III(A) dated 3 November 2025, with 18 months from that date to submit its report. No report, no interim report and no interim relief has issued, and the Resolution fixes neither a fitment factor nor an effective date. Any figure circulating for an 8th CPC loco pilot salary is a projection, not an order.

The running-staff rates are on a separate track in any case. The Ministry of Finance Resolution dated 6 July 2017 on the 7th CPC allowances left the kilometreage and related rates to be settled by the Ministry of Railways in bilateral discussion with the All India Railwaymen’s Federation and the National Federation of Indian Railwaymen, with the concurrence of the Ministry of Finance. That is why the 7th CPC kilometreage rates were notified only in May 2019, effective from July 2017, and why the enhancement triggered by dearness allowance reaching 50% on 1 January 2024 was notified only in March 2026. A loco pilot should expect the pay matrix and the kilometreage table to move on different timetables after the next pay commission as well.

Common misconceptions

That the loco pilot grades sit at different pay levels. Loco Pilot (Goods), (Passenger) and (Mail or Express) all sit at grade pay 4200 and Level 6 under Railway Board letter No. E(GP)2019/2/25 dated 9 April 2026. They are separate seniority units with different kilometreage rates and different Additional Allowance rates, not different pay levels.

That the pay element is paid in cash. It is not. RBE No. 85/2019 reckons 30% of basic pay as pay for computing other benefits, and 55% for retirement benefits. Nothing under that head is credited to the pay slip; the effect shows only in the size of the dearness allowance, the house rent allowance, the pension contribution and the eventual pension.

That the Additional Allowance counts for pension. RBE No. 85/2017 states that it does not. The pay element does; the Additional Allowance does not, and confusing the two overstates a Mail or Express loco pilot’s pension by about Rs. 1,100 a month on the 50% computation.

That the kilometreage allowance is a fixed monthly figure. It is earned on the distance actually run, so it varies with the diagram. Two loco pilots of the same grade on the same basic pay can differ by several thousand rupees in the same month.

That an ALP’s in-hand equals a plain Level 2 in-hand. It does not. The kilometreage allowance and the 30% pay element together add roughly Rs. 16,000 a month at 60% dearness allowance in an X-class city, which is more than the entire dearness allowance of a non-running Level 2 employee.

Related Articles

• Running allowance
• Railway employees
• Railway Group D salary
• Railway Recruitment Board
• Salary by pay level
• Salary by pay level calculator
• 7th CPC salary calculator
• Pay matrix
• 7th Central Pay Commission
• 8th Central Pay Commission
• Take-home salary of central government employees
• Dearness allowance
• House rent allowance
• Transport allowance
• Night duty allowance
• Overtime allowance
• National holiday allowance
• Allowances of central government employees
• Annual increment
• Pay fixation on promotion
• Modified Assured Career Progression
• Leave encashment
• National Pension System
• Unified Pension Scheme
• Old Pension Scheme
• Central government pension
• Commutation of pension
• Income-tax Act 2025
• New tax regime
• Standard deduction
• SSC CGL salary
• CAPF Constable salary
• Staff Nurse salary
• Central government jobs
• Central government employees in India

External references

• Indian Railways
• Railway Board, Ministry of Railways
• Indian Railway Establishment Manual, Volume I, Chapter IX
• Railway Recruitment Board, Chandigarh
• Research Designs and Standards Organisation
• Department of Expenditure
• Income Tax Department
• Pension Fund Regulatory and Development Authority

References

1. Railway Board letter No. E(P&A)II-2013/RS-14 dated 28 May 2019 (RBE No. 85/2019): pay element of 30% of basic pay for benefits other than retirement and 55% for pensionary benefits, and the 7th CPC kilometreage and Allowance in Lieu of Kilometreage rates effective 1 July 2017.
2. Railway Board letter No. E(P&A)II/2013/RS-14 (Part-2) dated 20 March 2026 (S.No. PC-VII/232): revised Kilometreage Allowance and Allowance in Lieu of Kilometreage for loco and traffic running staff with effect from 1 January 2024.
3. Railway Board letter No. PC-VII/2017/I/7/5/5 dated 10 August 2017 (RBE No. 85/2017): Additional Allowance to running staff with effect from 1 July 2017, with dearness allowance payable and no reckoning for pensionary benefits.
4. Railway Board letter No. E(GP)2019/2/25 dated 9 April 2026: equation of loco running staff pay levels with stationary staff for the integrated Group C seniority list.
5. Rules for the Payment of Running and Other Allowances to the Running Staff on Railways, 1981, in force from 1 August 1981, reproduced in Chapter IX (paragraphs 901 to 930) of the Indian Railway Establishment Manual, Volume I.
6. Railway Servants (Hours of Work and Period of Rest) Rules, 2005, made under Section 136 of the Railways Act, 1989: rule 2(d) (ordinary rate of pay), rule 8 (rostered hours), rule 10 (averaging and overtime), rule 11 (Form A register) and rule 12 (periodical rest).
7. Railways Act, 1989 (Act 24 of 1989), Section 132: hours of employment by classification, with 54 hours a week on an average over a two-weekly period of fourteen days for continuous employment.
8. Railway Recruitment Boards, Centralised Employment Notice CEN No. 01/2026 (Assistant Loco Pilot): post table, paragraph 3.0 (medical standards), paragraph 12 (recruitment process) and Annexure A (educational qualification).
9. Central Civil Services (Revised Pay) Rules, 2016 (G.S.R. 721(E), 25 July 2016) and the Railway Services (Revised Pay) Rules, 2016: the 7th CPC pay matrix.
10. Department of Expenditure Office Memorandum No. 1/1(i)/2026-E.II(B) dated 22 April 2026: dearness allowance at 60% of basic pay with effect from 1 January 2026.
11. Income-tax Act, 2025 (Act No. 30 of 2025), Section 11 with serial number 13 of the Table in Schedule III (prescribed allowances) and Section 202 (the default regime); Central Board of Direct Taxes Notification No. 22/2026, G.S.R. 198(E), dated 20 March 2026 notifying the Income-tax Rules, 2026, rule 280(2) of which prescribes the allowances and the extent of exemption for that serial number.
12. Department of Expenditure Resolution F. No. 01-01/2025-E.III(A) dated 3 November 2025 constituting the 8th Central Pay Commission; and Ministry of Finance Resolution dated 6 July 2017 on the 7th CPC allowances, leaving running-staff rates to the Ministry of Railways.
13. Railway Board letter No. E(P&A)II-2011/RS-51 dated 17 April 2012 (RBE No. 51/2012): the 30% pay element is not reckoned for the payment of transport allowance to running staff.
14. Railway Board letter No. E(P&A)II-2015/RS-25 dated 13 November 2017: Loco Inspectors draw the 30% add-on for retirement benefits under paragraph 5.5 of letter No. E(P&A)II/83/RS-10(iv) dated 25 November 1992 and are not entitled to the 55% element.