The issue of return to the depositors would be discussed at a meeting of the "Finance and Investment Committee" (FIC) on Thursday, agenda for which lists that maintaining an 8.5 per cent interest could still give the fund a surplus of Rs 6.4 crore (Rs 64 million) on the investment made by the Fund.

"If EPFO maintains the interest rate of 8.5 per cent on PF deposits, there will be a surplus of Rs 6.4 crore at an estimated income of Rs 12,994 crore (Rs 129.94 billion) in 2009-10," an EPFO source said.

He said in case the interest is raised to 8.75 per cent, the fund would suffer a loss of Rs 366.77 crore and the deficit would be still higher at Rs 739.94 crore if the rate of interest is fixed at nine per cent.

FIC gives recommendations on financial matters to the apex EPFO body Central Board of Trustees (CBT), which takes the final call.

EPFO is managing a corpus of about Rs 1,82,000 crore (Rs 1,820 billion). It had announced 8.5 per cent interest payout for subscribers for 2008-09 last month and made up for the Rs 139 crore (Rs 1.39 billion) losses from its contingency fund of Rs 150 crore (Rs 1.5 billion).