Special Allowance for Child Care for Women with Disabilities

The Special Allowance for Child Care for Women with Disabilities is a fixed monthly allowance of Rs. 3,750 paid to a woman central government employee with a disability of at least 40%, from the birth of her child until the child is two years old, for a maximum of her two eldest surviving children. Its conditions are set by Department of Personnel and Training Office Memorandum No. A-27012/03/2017-Estt.(AL) dated 16 August 2017, effective 1 July 2017, and the Rs. 3,750 rate runs from 1 January 2024 under DoPT OM No. A-27012/01/2023-Pers.Policy(Allowance) dated 25 April 2024.

The allowance has existed since 1 September 2008, when the 6th Central Pay Commission round introduced it at Rs. 1,000 a month. It has risen four times since: twice through the dearness allowance escalator in 2011 and 2014, once when the 7th Central Pay Commission doubled it in 2017, and once more through the escalator in 2024. Over a full two-year period at the current rate it is worth Rs. 90,000 for one child.

It is narrow by design. The disability that counts is the mother’s, not the child’s, which separates it from the double-rate children education allowance and hostel subsidy. Men are outside it, including a single father with a disability. And it is taxable in full under both regimes of the Income-tax Act, 2025, because no rule prescribes it for exemption.

The sections below give the rate history with the order behind each figure, the four conditions of the 2017 order, the disability definition and the open question over the Rights of Persons with Disabilities Act, the rules on two children and on twins, the escalator, the railway orders, the tax treatment, and the points on which the orders are silent.

Rate history from 2008 to 2024

The allowance has been Rs. 3,750 a month since 1 January 2024, and every figure before it traces to a DoPT order fixing the rate from a stated date. The table below is the full sequence.

Two patterns run through the table. Each escalator step added 25% of the base rate in force at the time, Rs. 250 on a Rs. 1,000 base and Rs. 750 on a Rs. 3,000 base, so the increments are flat sums and do not compound. And the effective date of every escalator step is the date the dearness allowance crossed the threshold, while the DoPT order fixing the new rupee figure followed about four months after that date: the 2024 order came 44 days after the Department of Expenditure OM of 12 March 2024 that took dearness allowance to 50%.

The 1 July 2017 date for the 7th CPC rate is later than the 1 January 2016 start of the revised pay. That gap is common to the 7th CPC allowances, which the government implemented from 1 July 2017 after the Committee on Allowances reported, while pay itself was revised from 1 January 2016 under the CCS (Revised Pay) Rules, 2016.

The four conditions in the 16 August 2017 order

DoPT OM No. A-27012/03/2017-Estt.(AL) dated 16 August 2017 is the operative text, and its paragraph 1 has four clauses. The 25 April 2024 OM changed only the rupee figure and kept the rest “subject to other conditions mentioned” in the 2017 order, so these four clauses are the current law.

The preamble states the purpose: the instructions are for “providing extra benefits to women employees with disabilities especially when they have young children and children with disability”. The clauses then read:

1. Rate and period. Paragraph 1(i) provides that women with disabilities are paid the allowance, then Rs. 3,000 a month, “from the time of the child’s birth till the child is two years old”.
2. Number of children. Paragraph 1(ii): “It shall be payable for a maximum of two eldest surviving children.”
3. Disability. Paragraph 1(iii) defines disability as “a minimum Disability of 40%” as elaborated in the 1 June 2001 notification No. 16-18/97-NI.I, “amended from time to time”.
4. Escalation. Paragraph 1(iv): “The above limit would be automatically raised by 25% every time the Dearness Allowance on the revised pay structure goes up by 50%.”

Paragraph 2 makes the orders effective from 1 July 2017. Paragraph 3 records that they were issued in consultation with the Comptroller and Auditor General for persons serving in the Indian Audit and Accounts Department, which is the standard clause extending a DoPT allowance order to that department.

The order is short. It prescribes no certificate procedure, makes no condition about the husband’s employment, says nothing on adoption or leave, and does not refer to the 2008 order or its 2011 clarification.

Eligibility: a woman employee with a disability of at least 40%

A woman central government employee qualifies if she has a disability of at least 40%, assessed under the notification of 1 June 2001. Sex and the 40% threshold are the whole of the eligibility test; pay level, group, and length of service play no part.

The 1 June 2001 notification No. 16-18/97-NI.I was issued by the Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment, although the DoPT orders of 2008 and 2017 both call it the “Ministry of Welfare’s Notification”. Its subject is the guidelines for evaluating various disabilities and the procedure for certifying them. Paragraph 3 fixes the threshold: “The minimum degree of disability should be 40% in order to be eligible for any concession/benefits.” Paragraph 4 gives certification to a medical board constituted by the central or a state government.

Two groups fall outside the order on its words. A male employee with a disability does not qualify, including a single father, because the order provides for “women with disabilities”. And a woman without a disability whose child has one does not qualify, because the disability that counts is hers. Her support is the double rate of children education allowance once the child is in school, and the family pension to a disabled child after the employee’s death.

The Rights of Persons with Disabilities Act question

The Rights of Persons with Disabilities Act, 2016 replaced the 1995 Act and defines a person with benchmark disability in Section 2(r) as a person with not less than 40% of a specified disability. The Department of Empowerment of Persons with Disabilities notified fresh assessment guidelines on 4 January 2018, Notification No. 16-09/2014-DD-III.

For transport allowance, the Department of Expenditure has moved to the new framework explicitly. Its compendium OM No. 21/1/2018-E.II(B) dated 15 September 2022, issued “in supersession of all earlier instructions issued on the subject”, grants the double rate to employees with benchmark disability as defined in Section 2(r), lists categories of disability drawn from the 2016 Act, nine of them since an OM of the same number dated 29 July 2025 substituted the list, and bases certification on the 4 January 2018 notification.

None of the DoPT orders on this allowance, from 2008 to 2024, does the same. The 25 April 2024 OM, the latest on it, still runs on the 2017 conditions and so on the 2001 notification “as amended from time to time”. The threshold is 40% under either text, so the practical difference lies in which disabilities are recognised and which certificate is accepted. A drawing office that accepts a 2016 Act certificate under the 2018 guidelines is reading “amended from time to time” to reach the replacement framework; no order states that reading in terms.

The period: from the child’s birth until age two

The allowance runs from the date of the child’s birth until the child turns two. Every version of the order has used the same words, from paragraph (i) of the 11 September 2008 OM to paragraph 1(i) of the 16 August 2017 OM.

At Rs. 3,750 a month, 24 months for one child come to Rs. 90,000, and two children to Rs. 1,80,000, if the rate does not move during the period. A step to Rs. 4,500 partway through would add Rs. 750 for each remaining month.

The period is fixed by the child’s age. The orders tie it to no other event, such as the mother’s return to duty, and prescribe no proration rule for a part month at either end.

Two eldest surviving children, and twins

The allowance is payable for a maximum of the two eldest surviving children, under paragraph 1(ii) of the 16 August 2017 OM. The phrase has a history across three orders, and the earlier versions still explain how the limit works.

The 11 September 2008 OM said “a maximum of two children”, without the words eldest or surviving. A 26 September 2011 DoPT clarification, OM No. 12011/04/2008-Estt.(AL), then answered two questions that departments had referred:

• Multiple births. “In case of multiple births at the time of first child birth, the woman employee shall not be entitled to this allowance at double the rate for multiple births.” Twins at a first delivery draw one allowance, not two.
• Death of a child. Asked whether a third child qualifies where the first or second has died before turning two, DoPT clarified that the allowance “is admissible for two years from the birth of the child so long as the woman employee does not have more than two surviving children”.

The 2017 wording, “two eldest surviving children”, writes the survival test into the order itself. A woman whose first child has died and who then has a second and a third child draws for the second and third, because those are her two eldest surviving children. A woman with two living children who has a third draws nothing for the third.

The twins clarification was given on the 2008 scheme, and the 2017 OM neither repeats nor withdraws it. The same two-child structure appears in child care leave under Rule 43-C of the CCS (Leave) Rules, 1972, which is granted for the two eldest surviving children, and in children education allowance.

The 25% escalator and the next step to Rs. 4,500

The allowance rises by 25% each time dearness allowance on the 7th CPC pay structure goes up by 50%, under paragraph 1(iv) of the 16 August 2017 OM. The first step fell due on 1 January 2024 and took the rate from Rs. 3,000 to Rs. 3,750.

The trigger was Department of Expenditure OM No. 1/1/2024-E-II(B) dated 12 March 2024, which raised dearness allowance to 50% of basic pay from 1 January 2024. DoPT then issued OM No. A-27012/01/2023-Pers.Policy(Allowance) dated 25 April 2024. Its paragraph 3 reads: “The rates of Special Allowance for Child Care to women with disabilities stands revised to ₹ 3750/- per month subject to other conditions mentioned in this Department’s O.M. No.A-27012/03/2017-Estt.(AL), dated 16.08.2017.” Paragraph 4 makes it effective from 1 January 2024. The same order fixed children education allowance at Rs. 2,812.50 and hostel subsidy at Rs. 8,437.50.

The 2024 order was issued on a different file from the 2017 one, A-27012/01/2023 under the Pers.Policy(Allowance) section, so a citation of the 2017 file number for the Rs. 3,750 figure is wrong.

DoPT’s consolidated allowances OM, No. DOPT-1712030994647 dated 2 April 2024, still prints Rs. 3,000. It was issued 23 days before the increase, and it summarises the allowance in two clauses that omit both the two-children limit and the disability definition. A reader relying on it gets the wrong rate and an incomplete set of conditions.

The next step falls due when dearness allowance reaches 100%. Dearness allowance is 60% from 1 January 2026 under Department of Expenditure OM No. 1/1(i)/2026-E.II(B) dated 22 April 2026. The 2011 and 2014 orders applied each step as 25% of the base rate, Rs. 250 on Rs. 1,000 each time, and on that pattern the next figure is Rs. 4,500, a further Rs. 750 on the Rs. 3,000 base. No order has yet fixed it.

Other semi-indexed 7th CPC allowances carry the same escalator. Constant attendance allowance also moved 25% on 1 January 2024, from Rs. 6,750 to Rs. 8,438, under Department of Pension and Pensioners’ Welfare Office Memorandum No. 1/5/2024-P&PW(F)-9809 dated 18 September 2024.

Why the 7th CPC doubled the allowance

The 7th Central Pay Commission recommended a factor of 2 for this allowance, against the factor of 1.5 it used for most semi-DA-indexed allowances, which took the rate from Rs. 1,500 to Rs. 3,000 a month in place of Rs. 2,250.

Paragraph 8.17.111 of the report, submitted on 19 November 2015, describes the allowance as “granted to differently abled female employees for taking care of their newborn child” at a then rate of Rs. 1,500 a month. Paragraph 8.17.112 gives the reasoning: the Commission “recognizes the huge responsibility that these women shoulder while raising their children”, and so, “instead of the factor of 1.5 that we have mostly used” for semi-DA-indexed allowances, it recommended a factor of 2. The same paragraph added the escalator, a further rise of 25% each time dearness allowance rises by 50%.

The allowance-by-allowance table lists it at entry 155 as “Retained. Enhanced by 100%.” In the chapter on employees with disabilities, paragraph 9.6.4(i) lists it among the existing special entitlements at Rs. 1,500, and paragraph 9.6.9(i) consolidates the recommendation: “In recognition of the singular responsibility faced by differently abled women in raising their children”, the allowance “has been enhanced from the present rate of ₹1,500 pm to ₹3,000 pm”.

The factor of 2 cost the government an extra Rs. 750 a month for each eligible woman above what the standard 1.5 factor would have given. The same chapter shows how the Commission treated other disability provisions. It kept double-rate transport allowance, raising the minimum from Rs. 1,000 to Rs. 2,250 a month, kept children education allowance and hostel subsidy at double rate for children with disabilities, raised constant attendance allowance from Rs. 4,500 to Rs. 6,750 by the 1.5 factor, and subsumed special disability leave into work related illness and injury leave.

Railway employees

Railway servants draw the allowance on the same terms through Railway Board letters that adopt each DoPT order. The Board’s practice is to enclose the DoPT order and apply it mutatis mutandis.

RBE No. 190/2017 reproduces the 16 August 2017 OM word for word and states that the instructions “shall apply mutatis-mutandis to Railway employees”, with effect from 1 July 2017. Railway employees are governed by the Indian Railway Establishment Code and Manual for most purposes, but on this allowance the railway position matches the civil one, conditions included.

Income tax: taxable in full under both regimes

The allowance is taxable in full as salary under the Income-tax Act, 2025, in the old regime and in the default regime of Section 202, from the tax year 2026-27 onward. No serial of Schedule III to the 2025 Act exempts it.

Apart from house rent allowance, which has its own exemption at serial 11 read with rule 279, an allowance paid with salary escapes tax only through serial 12 or serial 13 of the Table in Schedule III, the successors to Section 10(14) of the repealed Income-tax Act, 1961. Both apply only to allowances prescribed by rule 280 of the Income-tax Rules, 2026, notified by CBDT Notification No. 22/2026 dated 20 March 2026:

• Rule 280(1), for serial 12, prescribes seven allowances that meet expenses incurred in performing the duties of the office: travel on tour or transfer, transfer packing and transport, daily allowance, conveyance in performing duties, a helper, academic and research pursuits, and uniform. A child care allowance is not a duty expense.
• Rule 280(2), for serial 13, prescribes a table of 15 allowances with monthly caps, including children education allowance at Rs. 3,000 a month a child and hostel expenditure at Rs. 9,000 a month a child. This allowance is not among the 15.

The default regime removes even those exemptions. Section 202(2)(a)(ii) computes total income without the serial 12 and serial 13 exemptions other than those prescribed, and rule 280(3) keeps only the travel, transfer, daily and conveyance allowances and the transport allowance for an employee with a disability. In both regimes, then, the full Rs. 3,750 a month is added to salary income and the employer deducts tax at source on it.

The earlier position is a matter of history only. The Income-tax Act, 1961 was repealed on 1 April 2026 by Section 536(1) of the 2025 Act, and income of the previous year 2025-26 and earlier is assessed under that Act. The income tax for government employees article sets out how salary income is computed under each regime, and the allowance appears in the gross salary on Form 16.

Points the orders do not settle

Five DoPT orders govern this allowance, those of 2008, 2011, 2014, 2017 and 2024, and between them they leave two common questions without a written answer. An employee whose case turns on either should seek a written ruling from the administrative ministry, which can refer the point to DoPT, before drawing.

Leave. None of the five orders mentions leave. The period is defined by the child’s age alone, from birth to the second birthday, with no condition of duty. The orders contain no exclusion for maternity leave, child care leave or extraordinary leave. Transport allowance is the contrast: paragraph 6.1 of the 2022 Department of Expenditure compendium bars it for calendar months wholly covered by leave, and the transport allowance orders state that bar expressly.

Adoption. Every version of the order measures the period from the child’s birth. None addresses an adopted child. The leave rules do address adoption separately, through child adoption leave of 180 days under Rule 43-B of the CCS (Leave) Rules, 1972, but that rule does not extend this allowance.

A third point is settled by the words of the order. The 2017 OM makes no condition about the husband and pays the allowance to “women with disabilities”, so a woman whose husband is also a government servant draws it on her own eligibility, and the father cannot draw it in her place.

Related provisions for employees with disabilities

The child care allowance is one of several provisions that give a central government employee with a disability, or the parent of a child with one, more than the standard entitlement. They are governed by different orders and turn on different people’s disability.

The double rate of transport allowance covers the widest range of disabilities. Paragraph B.1 of the 2022 compendium, as substituted on 29 July 2025, lists nine categories under the 2016 Act: locomotor disability, with spinal deformity and spinal injury as sub-categories; blindness and low vision; deaf and hard of hearing; speech and language disability; intellectual disability, including specific learning disabilities and autism spectrum disorder; mental illness; chronic neurological conditions; blood disorders; and multiple disabilities, including deaf blindness. A woman employee with a qualifying disability and a child under two can therefore draw both the double transport allowance and this allowance, since the orders impose no bar on drawing them together.

The disability pension and work related illness and injury leave apply where the disability arises from service. The child care allowance does not depend on how the disability arose.

The 8th Central Pay Commission

The 8th Central Pay Commission was constituted on 3 November 2025 under Justice Ranjana Prakash Desai and has made no recommendation on this allowance. No figure for the allowance after the 8th CPC exists to be stated.

The 7th CPC precedent shows the questions a pay commission decides for it: the multiplying factor on the base rate, which was 2 in 2015 against the usual 1.5, and whether to keep the dearness-allowance escalator. Until the 8th CPC’s recommendations are accepted and DoPT issues an order on them, the rate is Rs. 3,750 a month on the conditions of the 16 August 2017 OM, with the next escalator step due when dearness allowance reaches 100%.

Related Articles

• Children education allowance
• Hostel subsidy
• Transport allowance
• Constant attendance allowance
• Family pension to a disabled child
• Disability pension
• Rights of Persons with Disabilities Act, 2016
• Child care leave
• Maternity leave
• Child adoption leave
• Paternity leave
• Special casual leave
• Special disability leave
• Work related illness and injury leave
• Extraordinary leave
• CCS (Leave) Rules
• Dearness allowance
• House rent allowance
• Family planning allowance
• Allowances for central government employees
• Abolished allowances under the 7th CPC
• Committee on Allowances
• CCS (Revised Pay) Rules, 2016
• Pay matrix
• 7th Central Pay Commission
• 8th Central Pay Commission
• Department of Personnel and Training
• Department of Expenditure
• Comptroller and Auditor General
• Railway employees
• Income-tax Act, 2025
• Section 202: the default new regime
• Old tax regime
• New tax regime
• Income tax for government employees
• Form 16
• Drawing and disbursing officer
• Take-home salary for central government employees
• Central government employees in India

External references

• Department of Personnel and Training, OM dated 16 August 2017 on the Special Allowance for Child Care for Women with Disabilities
• Department of Personnel and Training, OM dated 28 April 2014 revising the allowance to Rs. 1,500
• Department of Expenditure, compendium OM dated 15 September 2022 on double-rate transport allowance
• Department of Expenditure, transport allowance orders
• Department of Empowerment of Persons with Disabilities
• Income Tax Department, Income-tax Act, 2025 and Rules

References

1. Department of Personnel and Training, Office Memorandum No. A-27012/03/2017-Estt.(AL) dated 16 August 2017, Special Allowance for Child Care for Women with Disabilities, paragraphs 1(i) to 1(iv), 2 and 3 (Rs. 3,000 a month from the child’s birth till the child is two years old; two eldest surviving children; 40% disability under the notification of 1 June 2001; 25% rise for each 50% rise in dearness allowance; effective 1 July 2017).
2. Department of Personnel and Training, Office Memorandum No. A-27012/01/2023-Pers.Policy(Allowance) dated 25 April 2024, paragraphs 3 and 4 (Rs. 3,750 a month from 1 January 2024), consequent on Department of Expenditure Office Memorandum No. 1/1/2024-E-II(B) dated 12 March 2024.
3. Department of Personnel and Training, Office Memorandum No. 12011/04/2008-Estt.(Allowance) dated 11 September 2008 (Rs. 1,000 a month from 1 September 2008), and clarification Office Memorandum No. 12011/04/2008-Estt.(AL) dated 26 September 2011 (multiple births; more than two surviving children).
4. Department of Personnel and Training, Office Memorandum No. 12011/01/2011-Estt.(Allowance) dated 4 May 2011 (Rs. 1,250 from 1 January 2011), and Office Memorandum No. A-27012/1/2014-Estt.(Allowance) dated 28 April 2014 (Rs. 1,500 from 1 January 2014).
5. Report of the Seventh Central Pay Commission, 19 November 2015, paragraphs 8.17.111 and 8.17.112, 9.6.4 and 9.6.9, and the table of allowances at entry 155.
6. Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment, Notification No. 16-18/97-NI.I dated 1 June 2001, guidelines for evaluation of various disabilities and procedure for certification, paragraphs 3 and 4.
7. Department of Expenditure, Office Memorandum No. 21/1/2018-E.II(B) dated 15 September 2022, compendium of instructions on transport allowance at double the normal rates to persons with disabilities, paragraphs A, B.1, B.2, 4.2 and 6.1.
8. Railway Board letters RBE No. 150/2008 dated 13 October 2008, RBE No. 190/2017 dated 7 December 2017, and RBE No. 40/2024 dated 7 May 2024.
9. Income-tax Act, 2025 (Act No. 30 of 2025), Schedule III, Table serials 12 and 13, and Section 202(2)(a)(ii); Income-tax Rules, 2026, notified by CBDT Notification No. 22/2026 dated 20 March 2026, rule 280(1), (2) and (3).