NEW DELHI: With several overseas Indians looking forward to returning to their motherland, the Central government has now allowed people of Indian origin holding citizenship of other countries to participate in the National Pension Scheme (NPS). The regulators claim the scheme has received a great interest from overseas citizens.
“The scheme (NPS) was already a hit with Non-Resident Indians (NRI). And now with Overseas Citizens of India (OCI) also allowed to participate, we have received several queries and compliments from such citizens who are either looking forward to returning to India or whose parents are still living in India. We expect this scheme to be a huge success,” said a senior official with the Pension Fund Regulatory and Development Authority (PFRDA).
However, both OCIs and NRIs will not be allowed to open NPS Tier-II accounts. Earlier, NRIs were allowed to invest in NPS only through the offline mode. In 2016, NRIs were allowed to join and subscribe to NPS online through e-NPS.
All OCIs except those from Pakistan and Bangladesh are eligible to apply under the scheme. An OCI is a person who is a citizen of another country, but was a citizen of India at the time of, or at any time after, the commencement of Indian Constitution; or who is a citizen of another country, but was eligible to be a citizen of India at the time of commencement of the Constitution.
The NPS is a government-run pension and investment scheme aimed at providing old age security. NPS was initially notified for Central government employees joining service on or after January 1, 2004, and subsequently adopted by state governments.
It was extended to all Indian citizens on voluntary basis from May 2009, to corporates in December 2011, and to NRIs in October 2015. With the latest addition, any Indian citizen, resident or non-resident, and OCIs are eligible to join NPS till the age of 65.
“This is a welcome move as there are many who have taken up foreign citizenship while working overseas and may prefer to continue investing in India from local income sources. Some OCIs have also returned to India permanently while continuing to maintain their foreign citizenship,” said Alok Agrawal of Deloitte India.