Fresh recruit? Find your own LTC blocks

New to LTC? Enter your date of joining. You will get a simple year-by-year table: which LTC you can take in each year, and when a grace period lets you use an LTC you missed.

First, four words you need

• Home Town LTCThe Government pays your family's fare from your office station to your declared home town and back.
• Anywhere in India LTCThe fare to any one place in India that you choose and declare before you travel.
• BlockA fixed period in which one LTC can be taken. Four-year blocks (2022–2025, 2026–2029) are each split into two two-year blocks (2026–27 and 2028–29).
• Grace periodOne extra year. An LTC you did not use in its block can still be taken in the first year of the next block.

How it works

• You become eligible after completing one year of continuous service.
• First 8 years (fresh recruit): one LTC every year. In each set of four years you get three Home Town LTCs and one Anywhere in India LTC (in the 4th and the 8th year).
• If your home town and headquarters are the same place, you get only the Anywhere in India LTC in the 4th and 8th years.
• In these 8 years there is no grace period — an LTC not used in its year is lost.
• After 8 years (regular rules): one Home Town LTC in every two-year block. Once in the four-year block you may take an Anywhere in India LTC in place of one Home Town LTC.

Grace period (carry-over) in simple words

• It applies only under the regular rules, not during the fresh-recruit years.
• An unused Home Town LTC of a two-year block can be taken up to 31 December of the next year. Example: the 2024–25 Home Town LTC can be used till 31 December 2026.
• An unused Anywhere in India LTC of a four-year block can be taken up to 31 December of the first year of the next block — but only if the Home Town LTC of the last two-year block is also unused. Example: the 2022–2025 Anywhere in India LTC can be used till 31 December 2026, if you did not take the 2024–25 Home Town LTC.
• The outward journey must start on or before that 31 December. The return journey can be later.
• Using a grace-period LTC does not reduce the LTC of the new block.

Example: joined on 8 October 2012

The fresh-recruit years ran from 2013 to 2020. 2021 had no LTC. From 2022 the regular blocks apply: 2022–23 and 2024–25. So in 2026 the grace period is running: an unused 2024–25 Home Town LTC (or the unused 2022–2025 Anywhere in India LTC) can still be taken if the outward journey starts by 31 December 2026 — and the 2026–27 LTC remains available as well.

Official sources

• DoPT OM No. 31011/4/2008-Estt.(A) dated 23.09.2008 — LTC for fresh recruits
• DoPT FAQs on LTC entitlements of fresh recruits, OM No. 31011/7/2013-Estt.A-IV dated 26.09.2014 (with illustrations)
• DoPT OM dated 03.09.2025 — consolidated LTC guidelines (Rule 10: carry-over of LTC)

This table is a guide. Your office's service records decide your actual entitlement.