KOLKATA: West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Friday announced an additional 18 per cent dearness allowance (DA) to state government employees from January 2019."We have decided to provide an additional 18 percent DA to the state government employees including teachers and non-teaching staff and employees of rural and urban local bodies. This will be effective from next January," she told reporters at the state secretariat, Nabanna.Banerjee said the Bengal government was going through a "tight financial condition" but has decided to release the additional DA as per its commitment to the government employees."This has been decided as per our prior commitment towards the state government employees. We are announcing it a bit early because we have to follow some planning. The state government will have to bear an annual additional expenditure of Rs 5,000 crore," she said.The Chief Minister said that the erstwhile Left Front government had managed to provide a 35 per cent DA to the state government employees while her government has given a hike of 90 per cent DA."Despite our financial crisis and repaying loan to the Centre and running several welfare schemes for people, we have provided 90 per cent DA to our employees," she added.

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