The government of India will pay the EPF contribution both of the employer and the employee (12% each) for the next three months, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman has announced.

This will be applicable for establishments with up to 100 employees, where 90% of employees drawing less than Rs 15,000 salary.

Benefiting 4.8 crore employees the govt also amended EPFO regulations to allow workers under EPFO to draw up to 75% of their non-refundable advance or 3 months of wages, whichever is lower.

Sitharaman announced a slew of measures to deal with the economic distress caused due to the coronavirus pandemic and the subsequent lockdown announced to deal with the situation.

The finance minister had already announced some measures on Tuesday, including extension of tax deadlines, easing minimum balance norms for savings account, and increasing threshold of insolvency filing to Rs one crore from Rs one lakh.

The Prime Minister had announced an Economic Task Force to be chaired by the finance minister.

The 21-day lockdown announced by Prime Minister Narendra Modi will affect the revenue stream of companies and hit their bottomlines. Various rating agencies have revised downwards their growth estimates for FY21.