Only 76 of the over 17,000 registered companies in the northeastern region have so far opted to enrol their employees under the National Pension System (NPS), a senior government official said here on Tuesday.

He said, however, it was not clear how many of the registered companies were still active or fell in the category under which firms were liable to extend pension benefits to their workers.

Addressing a press conference here, Pension Fund Regulatory and Development Authority (PFRDA) chairperson Deepak Mohanty said, “A total of 85,000 employees of corporate and private sector firms, including 16,000 in Assam, have enrolled for NPS in the Northeast. The corpus fund under it is Rs 4,300 across the region, of which Rs 1,000 is in Assam.”

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When asked about the total number of registered companies in the Northeast, Mohanty, citing data from the Ministry of Corporate Affairs, said the region has 17,000 registered companies, of which only 76 firms have opted for NPS.

“But we don’t have the data on how many of these are still active. Then again, some may not fall under the categories which make pension and other benefits mandatory for its employees depending on the size of their workforce and other factors,” he said.

Assuaging apprehensions that pension drawn will be less under NPS compared to under the Old Pension Scheme (OPS), the official said, “If a person is under NPS for a short period, the amount could be less. But otherwise, it will not be the case.”

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Mohanty, who participated in an NPS awareness programme for corporates earlier in the day, said, “We are here with the objective of making the corporates aware of the benefits under NPS.”

The conference was attended by over 130 delegates from 65 MSMEs and other entities.

Sharing the national figures, he said 144 lakh employees, including 90 lakh government ones, have enrolled under the NPS so far.

The corpus fund under the scheme is at Rs 11.5 lakh crore, including contributions under Atal Pension Yojana, and the amount is constantly increasing.