Leave Travel Concession (shortly called LTC) is one of the most lucrative entitlement of the central Goverment employees. LTC scheme is a concessional travel facility for the Government employees to visit their Home Town or to visit any place in India.

LTC entitlement of the employees is different in the first eight years of the service than the regular provisions. Before understanding the entitlement of the new Govt. Employees, it is important to understand the concept of type of LTC, Block Years, and the regular provisions.

Types of LTC:

LTC are of two types, viz. –

(a) Home Town LTC: LTC to visit to the Home Town declared by the employees.

(b) All India LTC: LTC to provide any place in India, ncluding the Home Town of the employee.

Block Years for LTC:

LTC are provided for particular Block Years. Each sub-Block consists of two years for Home Town LTC, and two sub-Blocks are combined to form a four-year Block for All India LTC. The blocks remain fixed.

The current block of four years is 2022-2025 with two years sub-block of 2022-2023 and 2024-2025.

Regular LTC Provisions in brief:

(a) The Leave Travel Concession shall be admissible after the employee has completed one year’s continuous service on the date of journey performed by him/her or his/her family, as the case may be.

(b) The employees have the option either to avail Home Town LTC twice in a block of two years each, or to visit Home Town once in a period of two years and to visit any place in India in another block of two years, within the block of four years.

(c) Unaviled LTC for a block may be carried forward and availed during the first year of the next block. For example, LTC of the 2024-2025 block may be availed during 2024 or 2025. If not availed, the same may be still availed in 2026.

(d) The outward journey must be commenced before last mid-night (0000 hrs) of the Block/Year. For example, LTC for the 2024-2025 block, journey may be commenced by mid-night of 31 December, 2025, or by mid-night of 31 December, 2026 (if acrried forward).

For, detailed provisions relating to LTC, please refer to DoPT website.

LTC Provisions for new Govt. employees:

Having understood the concept of type of LTC, Block Years, and the regular provisions, let’s proceed to understand the LTC Provisions for new Govt. employees.

(a) Available each year during first eight years of service.

(b) Carry forward is not permitted, if LTC of any year(s) is not availed during any year(s), except for the last occasion, which may be carried forward as per regular LTC provision.

(c) LTC to any place in India is admissible on the fourth occasion, after availing Home Town LTC for three occasions. That means Home Town LTC is available during 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 6th, 7th, and 8th year service and LTC to any place in India is admissible only during 5th and 9th year service.

(d) After completion of the first 8 years of service, the employees are convetred to regular LTC.

(e) The block periods remain same for new employees as well. Thus, if they avail LTC to any place in India on the last occasion, they are no more eligible for another LTC to any place in India in the relevant regular block.

(f) LTC to J&K, NE Region and A&N Islands in lieu of Home Town under special provisions being extended from time to time may also be availed by the new recruits. This special provision can be availed against any one of their HT entintlement in the regular LTC block of four years.

Illustrations:

The following table gives an illustration of LTC entitlement of the new Govt. employees during first eight years of service.

Note that the employee joined on 01/01/2022 moved to regular LTC provisions from 01/01/2030 after completing initial 8 years of his service. Thus, he may avail the 8th LTC in the two-years block of 2030-2031, and even carry that forward to 2032. Further, he may avail the 8th LTC for All India or Home Town and the 9th LTC will be the other one, i.e. Home Town, if he utilises 8th LTC as All India and vice versa.

Similarly, the employee joined on 01/07/2023 and 31/12/2023 moved to regular LTC from 01/01/2031 and 01/01/2032, respectively.

Further note that while the employee joined on 01/01/2022 got the whole year (2023) for availing his 1st LTC, the employee joined on 01/07/2023 has only 6 months (July to Dec) for availing his 1st LTC, and the employee joined on 31/12/2024 will get only 1 day (31/12/2025) for availing his 1st LTC. All are getting the whole year from thier 2nd LTC.