PFRDA held the Atal Pension Yojana Annual Felicitation Programme in New Delhi, recognising banks and entities for outstanding APY enrolment performance. APY, launched in May 2015, targets unorganised sector workers aged 18–40, guaranteeing monthly pensions of ₹1,000–₹5,000 post-60. Total APY subscribers have crossed 7 crore. The scheme is administered by PFRDA under the National Pension System architecture. Government co-contributes 50% of subscriber contribution or ₹1,000 annually, whichever is lower, for eligible subscribers.

Atal Pension Yojana sits at the intersection of social security, financial inclusion, and pension reform — three themes UPSC GS3 examiners repeatedly return to. Understanding APY requires grasping the structural gap it addresses: India's unorganised sector employs over 90% of the workforce, yet almost none of them had access to defined-benefit pension products before 2015. APY replaced the earlier Swavalamban scheme and deliberately targeted the bottom of the income pyramid through the Jan Dhan banking infrastructure as its enrolment backbone.

The scheme works as a guaranteed pension product: a subscriber's monthly contribution is calibrated to their age at entry and the pension amount chosen. The government's co-contribution incentivised early adoption among non-income-tax-paying workers, though this co-contribution benefit was withdrawn for income-tax payers from October 2022 — a detail examiners have begun testing.

PFRDA's felicitation programme matters because it reveals the administrative architecture: banks (especially public sector banks, regional rural banks, and small finance banks) are the primary Points of Presence (PoPs) driving enrolment. Awards highlight which institutional channels work on the ground — relevant for UPSC questions on last-mile delivery and financial inclusion. The crossing of 7 crore subscribers makes APY one of the largest guaranteed pension programmes globally for the informal sector, a wayforward data point for GS3 essays on pension reforms.