Under the 6th Amendment to the Maldives Pension Act, regulations have been gazetted and implemented to allow members of the Maldives Retirement Pension Scheme (MRPS) who are aged 65 and above to reserve a spot for the mandatory Hajj pilgrimage using their pension savings.
Prior to this amendment, individuals aged 65 and above, or those who reached the age of 65 by the time their Hajj spot was confirmed, were not eligible to use funds from their Retirement Savings Account (RSA) to reserve a Hajj spot. With the amendment, eligible MRPS members of any age can now utilise their RSA funds for this purpose. This allows those who were previously unable to reserve a spot due to their age, as well as those who turn 65 while awaiting confirmation of a spot, to benefit from this opportunity.
To qualify for Hajj spot reservation under this scheme, members must not have previously performed the mandatory Hajj pilgrimage and must maintain a minimum balance of MVR 336,000 (three hundred and thirty-six thousand) in their RSA. Members who have utilized their pension savings as collateral under the Housing Benefit must also meet this minimum balance requirement after deducting the collateralised amount.
Under this regulation, members wishing to perform Hajj must pay 20 percent of the total Hajj price to the Maldives Hajj Corporation. A spot will then be reserved in accordance with the established order. The remaining 80 percent will not be immediately deducted from the member's RSA; instead, these funds will remain invested until they are officially transferred to the Maldives Hajj Corporation.
Furthermore, when calculating pension payouts for existing pensioners and newly retiring MRPS members, the amount reserved for Hajj will be excluded from the calculation.