Following the Supreme Court's directive, Nabanna has now begun the process of releasing dearness allowance (DA). Sources report that the Finance Department has already generated 'arrear statements' for many cases. This means the money will now go to the treasury or Pay and Accounts Office (PAO).

Consequently, it is expected that government employees will receive the first installment amount very soon whether in the General Provident Fund or directly in their accounts. It has been learned that government employees can now view their pending DA calculations on the government portal. Many Secretariat employees claim to have checked this since Wednesday afternoon.

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On March 15, the day voting was announced, Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee wrote on her X handle at noon: "I am happy to announce that our Ma-Mati-Manush government has delivered on its promise to all its employees and pensioners, and to lakhs of teachers and non-teaching staff of our educational institutions, as well as employees/ pensioners of our other grant-in-aid instititions like panchayats, municipal bodies, other local bodies etc. They will start receiving their ROPA 2009 DA arrears from March 2026 onwards as per the modalities detailed out in the Notifications issued by our Finance Department."

Following this, the state government issued a notification on March 16 announcing that the first phase would begin the process of settling 25 percent of pending DA from January 2016 to December 2019. This arrear will be settled in two installments. The first installment will be received by March 31. The next installment will be given in September. It has also been announced that necessary information from before 2016 will be collected and that money will also be settled.

Where can you check your arrears?

Go to the portal https://www.wbifms.gov.in/ and select the 'Arrear Statement' option from the 'My Document' option. There you can see the amount of your pending DA.

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Who will get money where?

Working Group-A, B, C level officers and employees will not receive DA arrear money in hand. Their money will be deposited in the General Provident Fund (GPF). The arrear DA money will go to the accounts of Group-D employees and pension recipients.

A Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) has already been issued. It clearly outlines what each person needs to do.