BHUBANESWAR: A number of elderly beneficiaries in Ganjam’s Patrapur block are not as lucky as 70-year-old Surya Harijan of Nabarangpur district whose struggles to collect old-age pension from bank drew the attention of Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman.
Several old-age pension beneficiaries of Patrapur are leading a miserable life since the last five months as they are unable to withdraw their allowance due to digitalisation of bank services. They are unable to open an account in bank or link passbooks with their Aadhaar card due to fingerprint mismatch owing to old age.
Seventy-five-year-old Pana Naik of Kolathia village under K Nuagaon panchayat in Patrapur is one such unlucky beneficiary. Unable to walk straight due to old age, she is forced to crawl with the help of her hands. Since the last five months, Pana is not receiving her old-age pension as she is unable to provide her fingerprint for opening an account.
Similar is the situation of Sakili Kanyari (75), Aji Kanyari (75), Parbati Pradhan (87), Raghunath Naik (80), Kama Naik (71) and Bhanu Naik (73) of Kolathia. Besides, over a dozen of elderly beneficiaries of Patrachudi village in Chandapur panchayat too are making rounds of bank kiosks for their pension in vain.
Earlier, these elderly beneficiaries received their monthly pension from their respective panchayat offices. To provide them respite from the pain of standing in long queues, the government began paying their pension online. But that has not helped the beneficiaries.
Social security officer of Patrapur block K Choudhury admitted that online payment of old-age pension has created several problems for beneficiaries. “We had approached the higher authorities requesting special arrangement for those unable to avail the benefit and also suggested for disbursing pension at their respective panchayat offices but to no avail,” he said.
Locals, meanwhile, said the administration should engage officials including bank mitras to disburse pension to elderly beneficiaries either at their doorsteps or special camps.“If the neighbouring Andhra Pradesh is distributing pension and PDS commodities at the doorsteps of beneficiaries, why can’t Odisha government do the same?” they questioned.
Last month, a video of Surya walking barefoot for several kilometres to collect pension from a bank in Jharigaon block of Nabarangpur district went viral on social media.In the video, the frail woman was seen walking barefoot in scorching heat with the support of a broken chair.After coming across the video, Sitharaman pulled up the bank authorities who assured to provide Surya her pension amount at her doorstep.