Unmarried, widowed & divorced daughters of govt staff eligible for pension

Bhopal: In a major decision, the state cabinet headed by chief minister Mohan Yadav on Tuesday approved a new rule in the Madhya Pradesh Civil Services (Pension) Rules whereby unmarried, widowed and divorced daughters of state govt employees were made eligible for family pension. Briefing the media after the cabinet meeting, minister for MSME Chaitanya Kashyap said, "Cabinet approved the provision made for divorced daughters of employees to now claim family pension."So far, only the spouse, dependent parents and dependent children up to the age of 25 were eligible to draw family pension of the deceased govt employee.A state govt release further clarified, "Under Rule 44 of the Madhya Pradesh Civil Services (Pension) Rules, 2026, unmarried, widowed and divorced daughters were included among the members eligible for family pension." The Council of Ministers approved the Madhya Pradesh Civil Services (Implementation of National Pension System) Rules, 2026, and the Madhya Pradesh Civil Services (Payment of Gratuity under the National Pension System) Rules, 2026. These rules will become effective from April 1, 2026. The Finance Department was authorised to publish the rules."In another decision, the cabinet approved Rs 7,133.17 crore for the continuation of schemes of the tribal affairs and women and child development departments from 2026-27 to 2030-31. According to the approval, Rs 2,350 crore was allocated for the tribal affairs department's PVTG (Particularly Vulnerable Tribal Groups) Dietary Grant Scheme, Rs 1,703.15 crore for the Integrated Hostel Scheme, Rs 1,416.91 crore for the CM Rise School Scheme, Rs 1,110 crore for the Housing Assistance Scheme, Rs 522.8 crore for fee reimbursement to the Board of Secondary Education, scholarships for Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribe candidates, and Rs 31.3 crore for the Chief Minister's COVID-19 Child Service Scheme of the women and child development department.Cabinet also approved Rs 366.72 crore for the electrification of 63,077 unelectrified households and 650 unelectrified govt institutions through the expansion of electrical infrastructure under the Dharti Aba Tribal Village Upliftment Campaign. This includes a central govt grant of Rs 220.03 crore and the state govt's share of Rs 146.69 crore. Additionally, an estimated cost of Rs 97 crore was approved for off-grid electrification of 8,521 households.The council of ministers also approved a one-time 5-year age relaxation for employees working in the IT cadre of the High Court and District Courts to participate in ongoing and future recruitment processes for the technical cadre. Currently, the age limit is 40 years for the unreserved category and 45 years for the reserved category.