THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Green or insensitivity... you name it! The recently-held scrutiny of social security pension beneficiaries found that the ineligible persons in the list included government employees, service pensioners and PSU staff. About five lakh persons abstained from the mustering which involved the collection of biometric details. Of them, the most number of ineligible beneficiaries were the “dead”, about 2.5 lakh persons.
Their relatives did not bother to inform the death to the local self-government. Direct benefit transfer was a boon for the relatives since they withdrew the amount using the ATM card of the deceased. The second largest category of ineligibles were those drawing pension from more than one LSG. Remarried women who continued to draw widow pension formed the third category.
And the fourth-largest group were government employees and pensioners. Scrutiny officers said the government employees who found place in the list were mostly part-time or contingent staff. Large number of family pensioners, that is, those drawing half the government pension amount of their deceased spouse, too enrolled in the scheme. The Finance Department has now asked all such persons to return the entire amount collected by them so far. They have also been advised to voluntarily ask the local self-governments to exclude them from the scheme.
The government has warned of disciplinary action against government employees drawing social security pension. Efforts are on to collect details of service pensioners who found place in the list.
A senior Finance Department officer said the exclusion of the ineligible will help the government save Rs 750 crore a year.
The state spends Rs 650 crore a month to pay pension to 48 lakh beneficiaries under five categories - agricultural labourer, old age, disability, unmarried women above 50 years of age and widows. The monthly payment is Rs 1,100 with some exceptions. “Considering the state’s stressed finances, we cannot afford the ineligible persons continue in the list. In fact this is a bold move of the government,” he said.