President Salary in India: Vice-President and Governor Pay, Pension

The current president salary in India is ₹5,00,000 a month, fixed by the Finance Act, 2018 with effect from 1 January 2016. The Vice-President draws ₹4,00,000 a month, but as Chairman of the Rajya Sabha, not as Vice-President. A Governor gets ₹3,50,000. All three also get rent-free official residences, and the President and Governor’s emoluments can’t be cut during their term. On retirement, a President receives half the salary, ₹2,50,000 a month, as pension for life.

The common mistake is to treat the three offices as one pay ladder run by a pay commission. They aren’t. Each figure sits in a different law: the President’s in the President’s Emoluments and Pension Act, 1951, the Vice-President’s in a 1953 Act on officers of Parliament, and the Governor’s in a 1982 Act. In 2018 Parliament amended all three through a single Finance Act. This note sorts out which law pays whom, what the pension rules are, and why none of these salaries needs a yearly vote in Parliament.

President, Vice-President and Governor Salary at a Glance

The table gathers the current figures and their legal homes.

Where the President’s Salary Comes From

Article 59(3) gives the President a rent-free official residence and the emoluments that Parliament determines by law. Until Parliament legislates, the Second Schedule applies. In 1950 that schedule fixed ₹10,000 a month for the President and ₹5,500 for a Governor, and it still prints those numbers, with footnotes pointing to the current amounts.

Parliament legislated early, through the President’s Emoluments and Pension Act, 1951. Its section 1A states the monthly emoluments. The figure has moved three times that matter for today’s reader:

A small trap for researchers: the Ministry of Home Affairs’ “updated” copy of the 1951 Act online still prints ₹1,50,000. The Legislative Department’s official text of the Constitution (as on 1 May 2024) records the ₹5,00,000 figure under the Finance Act, 2018. The later official source wins.

Why did the 2018 revision come when it did? The 7th Central Pay Commission’s matrix took effect on 1 January 2016 and put the Cabinet Secretary at Level 18, ₹2,50,000 a month. For two years after that, the country’s highest civil servant drew more than the President, whose emoluments were still ₹1,50,000 from the 2008 Act, and more than every Governor at ₹1,10,000. The Finance Act, 2018 closed that gap by raising all three heads and backdating the increase to the same date as the pay commission, 1 January 2016.

Article 59(4) adds that the President’s emoluments and allowances shall not be diminished during the term. That’s why a pay cut for the President is impossible mid-term, even when salaries elsewhere are frozen.

Why the Vice-President Is Paid as Rajya Sabha Chairman

The Vice-President has no salary as Vice-President. Article 64 makes the Vice-President the ex officio Chairman of the Rajya Sabha, and Article 97 lets Parliament fix the Chairman’s salary. Parliament did so in the Salaries and Allowances of Officers of Parliament Act, 1953. Section 3(1) now reads ₹4,00,000 a month, substituted by section 140 of the Finance Act, 2018 for the earlier ₹1,25,000, with effect from 1 January 2016.

The constitutional text resolves an obvious question: what happens when the Vice-President acts as President?

• Article 64 proviso: while acting as President, the Vice-President doesn’t perform the Chairman’s duties and isn’t entitled to the Chairman’s salary.
• Article 65(3): for that period, the Vice-President gets the President’s emoluments, allowances and privileges.

So the person never draws both salaries at once. The current Vice-President, C. P. Radhakrishnan, took office after the election of 9 September 2025, covered in the note on the 2025 Vice-Presidential election.

Governor’s Salary and the Two-State Rule

Article 158(3) mirrors the President’s provision for the Governor: a rent-free official residence and emoluments fixed by Parliament by law. Parliament fixed them in the Governors (Emoluments, Allowances and Privileges) Act, 1982, in force from 1 April 1987. Section 3 has moved from ₹36,000 a month to ₹1,10,000 (from 1 January 2006) and then to ₹3,50,000 (from 1 January 2016, by section 161 of the Finance Act, 2018).

Two rules in that law change what a Governor actually takes home:

• Pension offset: if a Governor is already drawing a pension from earlier government service, the emoluments are reduced by the amount of that pension. A retired civil servant or officer appointed Governor doesn’t draw both in full.
• Two or more states: under Article 158(3A), when one person is Governor of two or more states, the emoluments are shared among those states in the proportion the President fixes by order.

The Governor’s salary is charged on the Consolidated Fund of the state under Article 202(3)(a), not on the Union’s.

Pension and Benefits After Office

The 1951 Act’s section 2 gives a retiring President a pension of 50% of the President’s emoluments a month for life. At today’s ₹5,00,000, that works out to ₹2,50,000 a month. The Act also provides:

• a furnished residence without rent, two telephones, a mobile phone and a car, plus a Private Secretary and other secretarial staff;
• free medical treatment, and travel anywhere in India by the highest class with one companion;
• a family pension to the surviving spouse at 50% of the pension, which on today’s figure would be ₹1,25,000 a month;
• free medical attendance and treatment for the spouse for life.

A President who was earlier Vice-President gets no separate Vice-President’s pension under the Vice-President’s Pension Act, 1997. The 1951 Act’s proviso rules out drawing both.

What the Money Adds Up To

There’s no allowance-driven in-hand gap here as there is for a civil servant, because the President’s emoluments are a single fixed figure with residence, travel and household costs met from the office’s budget. A simple illustration, computed from the statutory figures:

The annual figures are gross, before any income tax. The 1982 Act gives an ex-Governor secretarial assistance for life under section 12A, but no pension of the kind the 1951 Act gives a former President.

Why These Salaries Are Charged Expenditure

These salaries don’t depend on Parliament’s annual vote. Article 112(3) lists expenditure “charged” on the Consolidated Fund of India, which Parliament may discuss but doesn’t vote on:

• Article 112(3)(a): the emoluments and allowances of the President and other expenditure relating to the office;
• Article 112(3)(b): the salaries and allowances of the Chairman and Deputy Chairman of the Rajya Sabha and the Speaker and Deputy Speaker of the Lok Sabha.

The point is independence. A government can’t pressure a President or a Rajya Sabha Chairman by threatening their pay. Parliament can still change the salary by law, as it did in 2018, but only for the future, and for the President and Governor never to their disadvantage mid-term.

How These Offices Compare

The comparison places the three heads beside other constitutional offices.

Members of Parliament and Chief Ministers are paid under different laws again. The MLA, MP and Chief Minister salary note covers them, and the office of profit note explains why a President or Governor can’t hold any other paid office alongside.

For an aspirant, the useful habit is to tie each figure to its article: 59 for the President, 64 and 97 for the Vice-President, 158 for the Governor and 112 for charged expenditure. The rupee amounts change with each revision; the constitutional design doesn’t. President Droupadi Murmu, profiled in this note, draws the ₹5,00,000 figure that has stood since 2016.

Frequently Asked Questions