HYDERABAD: Telangana chief minister K Chandrasekhar Rao will launch his government’s ambitious pension scheme ‘Aasara’ for old-aged, handicapped and widows at Kothur village of Shadnagar mandal in Mahabubnagar district on Saturday.
His cabinet colleagues would simultaneously launch the scheme in other districts. Elderly persons and widows would be given Rs 1,000, while handicapped would get Rs 1,500 pension every month.
Speaking to reporters on the Assembly premises here on Friday, panchayat raj minister KT Rama Rao said his government wants to provide pension to all the eligible beneficiaries. ‘’We will see that all the eligible person get the benefit,’’ he said. The first month pension would be paid in cash with each village as a unit and from next month the amount would be directly deposited in the beneficiaries’ bank or post office account, the minister said.
Nearly 39.9 lakh applications were received for the pension scheme out of which 19.3 lakh applications have been verified so far, he said and added that the verification of applications would be completed soon and distribution of pensions for the first month will be completed by the month end.
“Though our government was in favour of providing one pension per family, but if there are all the three categories(old-aged, handicapped and widows) in one family all the three will get separate pensions,’’ he clarified.
“We have asked the officials not to be strict while selecting the beneficiaries and include the names of beneficiaries certified by sarpanch and secretary or other authorised persons. The beneficiaries can submit the Aadhaar card and other identity proofs required to be eligible for the pension scheme within three months,’’ he said.
He said the pension scheme would put an additional burden of over Rs 3,000 crore on the exchequer. ‘’We are ready to spend more if required. We want to cover all the beneficiaries,’’ he remarked.