India’s pension regulator has introduced Retirement Income Schemes (RIS) and National Pension Scheme (NPS) withdrawal options, which allow participants to choose gradual withdrawals from their pension corpus after retirement while remaining invested in the scheme.
The regulator said the move aims to provide subscribers with “more flexible options for regular payouts during their decumulation phase while continuing to support corpus appreciation through retirement income schemes”.
According to a circular issued by the Pension Fund Regulatory and Development Authority on May 15, participants who opt for this facility will be able to receive payouts regularly – monthly, quarterly or annually – till the age of 85, or as per the option taken by the subscriber at the time of retirement from NPS.
Under RIS, participants will have the flexibility to choose phased withdrawals of their designated pension corpus through any drawdown option.
“Consequently, these withdrawals will have no impact on the mandatory annuitization requirement of 20% or 40% of the corpus, as the case may be, thereby ensuring that the minimum statutory requirement for lifetime pension remains intact,” the circular said.
Drawing options will be available under NPS for both government and non-government subscribers.
The PFRDA said the effective date of these guidelines will be announced once the necessary technical systems and operational frameworks are in place. The regulator noted that these directions were issued under the authority conferred by Section 14 of the PFRDA Act, 2013. It said the initiative was introduced in accordance with the PFRDA (Abandonment and Withdrawal under NPS) (Amendment) Regulations, 2025.
According to the latest PFRDA data, NPS had more than 21.7 million subscribers and more than ₹16 trillion in assets under management as of March 2026.
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