Paternity Leave for Central Government Employees

Paternity leave is 15 days for a male central government employee with fewer than two children, under Rule 43-A, around the birth. The conditions, timing and pay.

Updated 19 July 2026 · Reviewed by Salary-Calculator.in

Paternity leave is a 15-day leave for a male central government employee with fewer than two surviving children, granted under Rule 43-A of the CCS (Leave) Rules 1972 around the birth of a child, on full pay and without being debited to the leave account; a matching 15-day leave is granted to an adopting father under Rule 43-AA.

Paternity leave is the father’s counterpart to maternity leave, and it is deliberately modest: 15 days against the 180 days a mother draws, reflecting a support role at the birth rather than the recovery and care that maternity leave provides. It is nonetheless a real and protected entitlement, paid at full salary, kept off the leave account so it costs the employee nothing in earned or half pay leave, and, by the terms of the rule, not to be refused in the ordinary case. This article sets out its conditions, its timing, its pay, the versions of it for adoption and surrogacy, and how it fits among the other parental leaves.

The framework of all the parental leaves is in the maternity leave article, which covers the mother’s leave and summarises the father’s; this article is the detail on paternity leave. The wider leave code is in the CCS (Leave) Rules article.

What paternity leave is

Paternity leave is a recognised leave under Rule 43-A, introduced for central government employees in 1999 and given its place in the leave rules. It is granted to a male government servant, including an apprentice, on the occasion of the birth of a child, so that the father can be present and support the family around the confinement. It is short, fixed at 15 days, and it is not linked to any leave balance the employee has built up: it is a standalone entitlement that arises on the birth, not a draw on the earned leave or the half pay leave account.

Its purpose distinguishes it from the leaves that answer illness or planned absence. Where earned leave is the planned holiday and half pay leave the reserve for a long illness, paternity leave is an occasion leave, tied to a specific event and available only around it. That is why it comes with a timing window and lapses if not used: it is not a quota to be spent at leisure but a leave for a particular fortnight in the life of the family.

The conditions: 15 days and fewer than two children

Two conditions define who gets paternity leave. The first is that the employee is a male government servant, since the leave is the father’s provision, the counterpart of the mother’s maternity leave. The second is the family-size condition: paternity leave is granted to a male employee with fewer than two surviving children. An employee who already has two or more surviving children is outside the provision, in line with the small-family norm that runs through the parental-leave rules, the same condition that governs maternity leave and child adoption leave.

Within those conditions the quantum is fixed at 15 days, and it does not vary with the length of service, the pay level or the number of the child, as long as the fewer-than-two-children condition is met. It is a flat entitlement: the father of a first or a second child draws the same 15 days, and there is no accrual or accumulation, because paternity leave is not earned over time but arises on the birth.

The timing window

Paternity leave has a window, and this is the condition most often misjudged. It may be taken during the confinement of the wife, which the rule defines as the period from 15 days before the expected date of delivery to within six months from the date of delivery of the child. So the leave can be taken shortly before the birth, to be present for it, or at any time in the six months after, to support the mother and the newborn, or split across the window. What it cannot be is deferred beyond the six months: paternity leave not availed within the window is treated as lapsed.

The rule also protects the entitlement. It provides that paternity leave should not normally be refused under any circumstances, which sets it apart from the leaves that are granted subject to the exigencies of work. The combination of a protected grant and a six-month window means a father has real flexibility to choose when in the first half-year of the child’s life to take the leave, but must use it within that half-year or lose it.

Full pay, not debited, and combinable

Paternity leave is generous in the three ways that matter for the pay slip. First, it is paid at full leave salary, the pay drawn immediately before proceeding on the leave, so the 15 days carry the full salary and not a reduced rate. Second, it is not debited against the leave account: taking paternity leave does not reduce the earned leave or the half pay leave balance, so those continue to accrue and the earned leave available for encashment at retirement is untouched. Third, it may be combined with any other kind of leave, so a father can add paternity leave to a spell of earned leave to make a longer continuous absence around the birth.

The one leave paternity leave cannot be combined with is casual leave. This is not a special restriction on paternity leave but a consequence of the general rule that casual leave is not a recognised form of leave and cannot be combined with any recognised leave. So a father can join paternity leave to earned leave but not to casual leave, and the fortnight of paternity leave stands on its own or alongside the recognised leaves, not alongside casual leave.

Paternity leave on adoption

An adopting father is provided for separately, under Rule 43-AA. A male government servant with fewer than two surviving children who validly adopts a child below the age of one year is granted 15 days of paternity leave, to be availed within six months from the date of the valid adoption. It mirrors the ordinary paternity leave in quantum, pay and the fewer-than-two-children condition, with the triggering event being the adoption rather than a birth and the window running from the date of adoption.

The provision was widened by the CCS (Leave) (Amendment) Rules 2023. It now covers not only a valid adoption but also a child taken in pre-adoption foster care, so a father who takes a child into foster care with a view to adoption can draw the leave. That extension carries a condition: if the foster care is not followed by a valid adoption, the paternity leave already availed is debited to any other leave to the employee’s credit, so that a leave given on the expectation of adoption is recovered from the ordinary leave account if the adoption does not follow. The enhancement of the female adopter’s child adoption leave to 180 days and the male adopter’s paternity leave were part of the same broadening of the adoption provisions.

Paternity leave and surrogacy

The parental leaves were extended to surrogacy by the CCS (Leave) (Amendment) Rules 2024, notified on 18 June 2024, which brought a child born through surrogacy within the leave provisions for the first time. A commissioning father, the father of a child born through a surrogacy arrangement, is granted 15 days of paternity leave within six months from the date of the delivery of the child, on the same terms as ordinary paternity leave. The amendment also provided maternity and child-care analogues for the commissioning mother.

The point to note is that the surrogacy amendment kept the duration at 15 days. It widened the class of fathers who qualify, to include the commissioning father alongside the biological and the adopting father, but it did not lengthen the leave. Across all three routes to fatherhood the rules recognise, birth, adoption and surrogacy, the paternity leave is the same 15 days.

Applying for paternity leave

Paternity leave is applied for and sanctioned like any other leave, but its occasion and its window shape the application. An employee applies to the leave-sanctioning authority for the 15 days, stating the expected or actual date of delivery, and supports the claim with the birth record of the child, or, for the adoption and surrogacy versions, the adoption or surrogacy documents. Because the rule provides that paternity leave should not normally be refused, the sanction is close to automatic where the conditions are met, unlike casual leave or earned leave, which are granted subject to the work of the office.

The application can be made for a single 15-day spell or, within the six-month window, for the leave taken in parts, so a father can take a few days at the birth and the rest later while the leave remains within the window. What the employee must watch is the window itself: since paternity leave lapses if not availed within six months of the delivery, the leave must be taken within that period, and a father who leaves it too late loses the entitlement. Planning the leave against the six-month window, rather than treating it as an open quota, is the practical point.

The fewer-than-two-children condition in practice

The fewer-than-two-children condition decides eligibility, and a few situations are worth spelling out. The condition looks at the number of surviving children the employee already has at the time of the birth or adoption. A father of no children or one child qualifies; a father who already has two or more surviving children does not, whatever the circumstances of the new birth. It is the same small-family-norm test that governs maternity leave and child adoption leave, and it runs through the parental-leave provisions as a common thread.

The counting can produce results that surprise. Where a first confinement produces twins, the employee has two surviving children after it, so paternity leave is admissible for that birth but not for any later child, since the two-child threshold has been reached. The test is the number of surviving children, so a child who has died is not counted, and the position turns on the family as it stands at the birth in question. An employee unsure whether the condition is met for a particular birth should have it settled by the sanctioning authority against the record, because the entitlement stands or falls on it.

Paternity leave, pay and service

For the pay slip and the service record, paternity leave is treated kindly. The 15 days are paid at full salary, and that salary is part of the ordinary pay for the month, taxable as salary in the normal way, with no special income-tax exemption and none needed, since the employee is simply paid their pay for the fortnight. There is no leave salary computed at a reduced rate, as there is for half pay leave , because paternity leave is full-pay leave throughout.

For service, the key is that paternity leave is not debited to the leave account and is not a break in service. Because it is not charged to earned leave or half pay leave, those balances are untouched, which protects the earned leave available for encashment at retirement and the half pay leave reserve. And because the period is treated as authorised leave on full pay, it counts for the continuity of service and does not disturb the increment or the pension, so a father loses nothing in his pay progression or his retirement benefits by taking the 15 days. Paternity leave is, in short, a cost-free fortnight: full pay, no leave debited, and no effect on the increment or the pension.

Where paternity leave sits among the parental leaves

Paternity leave is one of a family of parental leaves in the CCS (Leave) Rules, and seeing them together prevents the common confusions. Maternity leave , under Rule 43, is 180 days for a woman government servant with fewer than two surviving children, the leave for the recovery from childbirth and the early care of the newborn. Child adoption leave , under Rule 43-B, is 180 days for a female government servant on the valid adoption of a child below one year. Child care leave, under Rule 43-C, is the long leave, up to 730 days over a career, to look after children, available to women employees and to a single male government servant.

Paternity leave is the distinct, short, male-specific provision alongside these. The line that most often confuses is the one between paternity leave and child care leave . Paternity leave is the 15-day leave any qualifying father, married or single, draws around the birth or adoption. Child care leave is the long leave for rearing a child, and among fathers it is available only to a single male government servant, an unmarried, widowed or divorced father, not to a married male employee. So a married father is entitled to the 15 days of paternity leave but not to child care leave, while a single father can draw both. Keeping the two apart, the short occasion leave and the long care leave, is the key to the male side of the parental leaves.

The debate on enhancing paternity leave

Paternity leave has been the subject of a public debate about whether 15 days is enough, and the article would be incomplete without noting where that stands. The current entitlement is 15 days, and no enhancement has been notified. There has been advocacy for a longer and more gender-neutral parental leave, including a recommendation from the Economic Advisory Council to the Prime Minister to move towards a phased rollout of a fuller paternity leave, and various proposals over the years for a statutory paternity benefit in the wider workforce. None of this has changed the rule for central government employees, which remains the 15 days of Rule 43-A.

What the recent amendments did change was the reach of the leave, not its length. The 2023 amendment brought foster care within the adoption provision, and the 2024 amendment brought surrogacy within the leave, so more fathers now qualify for paternity leave than before, but each still draws 15 days. An employee should therefore plan on 15 days as the entitlement, and treat any longer figure as a proposal rather than the current rule until a fresh notification changes it.

Applicability

Rule 43-A applies to central government civilian employees governed by the CCS (Leave) Rules 1972, including apprentices. Employees under other leave codes are governed by their own rules, which broadly mirror the provision but are separate instruments: members of the All India Services are under the All India Services (Leave) Rules 1955, railway servants under the Railway Servants (Leave) Rules, and staff of some autonomous bodies under rules that adopt or track the central provision. A father should confirm the entitlement under the leave rules that govern his own service, though for the great majority of central government civilian employees it is the 15 days of Rule 43-A set out here.

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)

How many days of paternity leave does a central government employee get?

15 days, under Rule 43-A of the CCS (Leave) Rules 1972. It is granted to a male government servant with fewer than two surviving children, on the birth of a child, at full pay. It is not debited to the leave account, so it does not reduce the earned leave or half pay leave balance.

When can paternity leave be taken?

During the confinement of the wife, meaning any time from 15 days before the expected date of delivery to within six months from the date of delivery of the child. If it is not availed within that window, it lapses. It can be taken in one spell or split within the window, and the rule provides that it should not normally be refused.

Is paternity leave debited from the leave account?

No. Paternity leave is not debited against the leave account, so it does not consume earned leave or half pay leave, and those balances keep accruing. It may be combined with any other kind of leave, such as earned leave, except casual leave, which under the leave rules cannot be combined with any recognised leave.

Can an adopting father get paternity leave?

Yes. Under Rule 43-AA, a male government servant with fewer than two surviving children who validly adopts a child below the age of one year is granted 15 days of paternity leave, to be taken within six months of the date of the valid adoption. Since the 2023 amendment the provision also covers a child taken in pre-adoption foster care, with the condition that if the foster care is not followed by a valid adoption, the paternity leave already availed is debited to the employee’s other leave.

Is there paternity leave for a child born through surrogacy?

Yes. The CCS (Leave) (Amendment) Rules 2024, notified on 18 June 2024, extended leave to surrogacy: a commissioning father, whose child is born through surrogacy, is granted 15 days of paternity leave within six months of the date of delivery of the child. The duration is the same 15 days as ordinary paternity leave; the amendment widened who qualifies rather than the number of days.

Has paternity leave been increased beyond 15 days?

No. The entitlement remains 15 days, and no enhancement has been notified. There has been public discussion, including a recommendation from the Economic Advisory Council to the Prime Minister to move towards a phased and more gender-neutral parental leave, but the current rule is unchanged at 15 days, and the recent amendments extended paternity leave to adoption, foster care and surrogacy without changing its length.

What is the difference between paternity leave and child care leave?

Paternity leave is 15 days for a male employee around the birth or adoption of a child, available whether the employee is married or single, subject to the fewer-than-two-children condition. Child care leave is a much longer leave, up to 730 days over a career, to look after children, and it is available to women employees and to a single male government servant, but not to a married male employee. So a married father gets 15 days of paternity leave but not child care leave, while a single father can get both.

External references

References

Central Civil Services (Leave) Rules, 1972, Rule 43-A (paternity leave): 15 days for a male government servant with fewer than two surviving children, from 15 days before to within six months of the date of delivery.
Central Civil Services (Leave) Rules, 1972, Rule 43-AA (paternity leave on adoption), as widened by the CCS (Leave) (Amendment) Rules, 2023 to cover pre-adoption foster care.
CCS (Leave) (Amendment) Rules, 2024 (notified 18 June 2024): extension of leave provisions to surrogacy, including 15 days of paternity leave for a commissioning father.
Department of Personnel and Training Office Memorandum dated 16 July 1999 (introduction of paternity leave for central government employees).
Central Civil Services (Leave) Rules, 1972, Rule 43-B (child adoption leave) and Rule 43-C (child care leave).