BHUBANESWAR: Ten districts in the state have the highest number of applications pending when it comes to generating unique disability identity (UDID) card for persons with disabilities (PwDs).
The districts are Cuttack, Balasore, Bhadrak, Balangir, Ganjam, Jagatsinghpur, Keonjhar, Nayagarh, Nuapada and Rayagada. Around 1.33 lakh applications are pending across the state and the majority are from these districts.
Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment’s department of Empowerment of Persons with Disabilities is implementing the ‘Unique ID for Persons with Disabilities’ project to create a national database for PwDs and issue UDID card to each person with disabilities.
The card delivers government benefits and travel concessions, to the person with disabilities. Disability certificates issued only through UDID portal by competent medical authorities are accepted throughout the state. Disability certificates issued in favour of PwDs in manual mode are no longer accepted.
According to reports of the Social Security & Empowerment of Persons with Disabilities (SSEPD) department, out of 11,90,223 registered UDID applications, 7,16,205 cards have been generated to date. At least 1,33,935 applications are pending for the generation of these cards.
Balasore has the highest of 22,960 applications pending followed by Ganjam (13,474) and Cuttack (7,137).
Odisha’s UDID pendency rate stands at 11.25 per cent since the project was launched in 2019. As per the 2011 census, there are 12.44 lakh PwDs in the state and 10.14 per cent of this population faces multiple disabilities.
“Even for getting a medical certificate which is important for submission of UDID application, one has to wait for several months. Without this card, there is no way of getting any benefit that the government has provisioned,” said Satya Behera, a Bhubaneswar-based student who faces locomotor disability.
Officials in the SSEPD department said the pendency was reviewed recently. Collectors of the 10 districts have been asked to focus on the issue of UDID card generation and bring down the pendency to below five per cent by November 30 this year.