Survey finds over 17k pensioners ineligible

JALANDHAR: A re-verification survey on the pensioners ordered by the state government in June, has shown that 7,128 dead persons were found pension beneficiaries, in the district. The report recorded that out of 1,17,487 pensioners, 1,05,343 were verified by the department in which 17,457 were found ineligible during the recent drive till October 27. The report has been submitted to the district administration by the social security department, which will be sent to the state chief secretary after a complete survey report.

The report states, 1,651 beneficiaries were underage. As per government norms, men above 65 years and women above 58 are eligible for the old-age pensions in the state. Further, 3,973 beneficiaries had wrong addresses and 3,800 were absent. As per the report, 7,128 beneficiaries were dead but the pensions were going into their accounts.

As many as 905 were found ineligible for other reasons, states the report. The new Congress government has increased the pension amount from ₹500 to ₹750 in July and ordered the re-verification to weed out ineligible beneficiaries.

DSSO Dalwinder Singh said that verification of beneficiaries is still on and will be completed soon. He said four types of pensions that include the widow, oldage, dependant and speciallyabled are running through the department. The Congress has also hiked the annual income limit of people eligible for pension and other social security schemes to ₹60,000 from ₹24,000.

As per the scheme conditions, an applicant should not be in government or private service, and should not have an annual income of more than ₹60,000 from any source.