The National Pension System (NPS) is a long-term retirement savings system in which subscribers contribute towards their pension corpus, with the money invested through pension funds. Lohia said there was a need to examine how much flexibility should be available to subscribers in their pension investments.
The comments come as the NPS subscriber base has grown 27% over the past year, according to PFRDA Chairman Sivasubramanian Ramann. The non-government sector is a key focus area for the pension regulator, he said. Raman also said NPS alone manages a corpus equivalent to about 5% of India’s GDP.
Lohia also stressed the responsibility of pension fund managers, saying NPS should not be treated like any other scheme.
“It’s important that pension fund managers know their responsibilities well; savers are handing over their life savings to you unlike other avenues,” he said.
He further called for systems that would help NPS succeed and encourage more people to join and contribute.
On the role of pension funds in infrastructure, Lohia said he was hopeful that long-term infrastructure investments would come from outside pension funds. He added that slowly, India’s own pension funds would be able to provide patient capital.