The Union Cabinet has approved a productivity-linked bonus of 78 days’ wages for non-gazetted railway employees for 2025-26, costing Rs 2,009.61 crore, according to Angel One’s report. It will be paid to 11,40,770 employees, ahead of Diwali, and the announcement was made by Union Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw on Wednesday, 14 October 2026, according to the report, though some summaries date the decision to 15 October.
The maximum amount for each eligible employee is Rs 17,951. The bonus is calculated on a wage ceiling of Rs 7,000 a month, which has not changed since 2014-15, and the figure of Rs 17,951 is the result of applying 78 days to that ceiling. That means the bonus for most staff is not related to their actual salary, which is higher, but to the ceiling, and it is the same upper limit for all of them.
The scheme covers a wide range of staff. The report lists track maintainers, loco pilots, train managers, station masters, supervisors, technicians, pointsmen and ministerial staff, along with other Group C employees. Officers in the gazetted ranks are not included, since the bonus is for non-gazetted employees.
The government linked the payment to performance. According to the report, Indian Railways achieved freight loading of 1,670 million tonnes and carried nearly 7.41 billion passengers in 2025-26, and the bonus is described as being in recognition of that performance. These figures come from the Angel One summary of the announcement and have not been checked against Railway Board data.
A comparison with earlier years is available. In October 2024, NewsOnAir reported that the Cabinet approved a 78-day bonus for 11.72 lakh non-gazetted railway employees, so the number of employees covered has fallen to 11.41 lakh from 11.72 lakh, a drop of about 31,000, which is IndiaX24’s subtraction from the two reported figures. The sources reviewed do not explain the change in the number of employees, and the bonus period of 78 days is the same.
The cost of the bonus is Rs 2,009.61 crore, which the report says will be borne by the Union government. Divided by the number of employees, it comes to about Rs 17,617 per head on average, on IndiaX24’s arithmetic, which is close to the maximum of Rs 17,951 and suggests that most employees receive the maximum or nearly so.
Such announcements usually come before Diwali, which is the main festival season, and a Ground News headline described this one as ahead of Diwali. A report on the deferral of the UPI merchant fee until after Diwali said that the new date was expected after 8 November, which indicates when the festival falls.
The same Cabinet cycle saw other decisions. On 6 October the Cabinet approved an SME Growth Fund and an Integrated Transport and Logistics Authority and took no decision on the dearness allowance for central employees, which IndiaX24 reports separately. Employee unions had urged an early announcement of festive relief.
The bonus is a recurring annual decision, with the same number of days in recent years, and the amount of Rs 2,009.61 crore reflects the number of employees and the unchanged wage ceiling.
Featured image: A statue near Rail Bhawan, the Railway Ministry’s headquarters in New Delhi (file photo). Photo by Likhith N.P, licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons.