New compensation norms in place, kin asked to submit fresh applications

PRAYAGRAJ : Following fresh guidelines issued by the state government in connection with giving compensation to the next of kin of those government servants who contracted Covid-19 while performing panchayat poll duties and died, the district administration has now asked the families of such individuals to apply afresh for the compensation in accordance with the new norms.

This time, the head of the department (where the deceased was employed) would need to endorse the duty slip and the same would have to be countersigned by the chief medical officer (CMO), endorsing the fact that the said employee died because of Covid. This document would need to be deposited with the district administration. ADM city has been made nodal officer for this process, as per officials.

During the election duty performed by the employees of the state government in April-May, the two months when the pandemic was at its peak, there were several employees who got infected and some of them even died. Later, when the state government asked to submit the claims for getting compensation from the family members of such deceased employees, families of 74 employees of the district had applied. Out of these, documents of 42 employees were complete in every aspect.

However, when scrutiny was done by the district administration officials, none of the claims were approved because according to the old rules, ex-gratia payment may be given only if the employee died either on duty or during travel to and from place of duty.

However, the new guideline issued by the state government say that kin of staff who died after contracting Covid-19 while on polling duty in the Uttar Pradesh panchayat elections, will now be eligible for ex-gratia compensation even if the death occurred 30 days after the day of duty. The government has also announced its decision to give compensation of Rs 30 lakh each to the kin of such an individual. But now all old applications stand invalid. The kin will need to submit new applications. The family members of the deceased have been asked to deposit documents, including certificate of election duty, report of corona infection and death certificate.

All the forms have to be submitted by the next of kin of the employees to the head of the department where they were posted. Once the Head of the department forwards the claim it would be signed by the CMO. After this the documents will be deposited with ADM city.

“The guideline that has been issued in terms of providing compensation to the next of kin of the deceased employee should have the signatures of the HoD and the CMO,” says ADM city, Ashok Kumar Kanaujia.