The American International Group will pay about $46 million in retention bonuses on Monday, or about 30 percent less than previously scheduled, a person with direct knowledge of the arrangements said.

Officials at A.I.G. are hoping that by holding back $21 million in bonuses they will put to rest a controversy that has plagued the insurer ever since its government rescue in the fall of 2008.

A.I.G. also hopes the cuts will satisfy the Treasury’s special master for compensation, Kenneth R. Feinberg, who has said that the insurer’s current and former employees should keep a pledge to return $45 million of a previous round of bonuses.

The bonuses in question were contractually granted early in 2008, months before the bailout, and were scheduled to be paid over two years. The original goal of the bonus program was to retain employees. But after the taxpayers came to A.I.G.’s rescue, the scheduled bonus payments seemed politically unthinkable as they covered people at the financial products unit, which dealt in the derivatives at the heart of A.I.G.’s near-collapse.