A 30-year-old typist, who works at the planning office in Nalgonda, has prepared a list of 125 welfare schemes introduced by the State and Central governments, compiled them into a 31-page handbook and started distributing it to people.
Dunna Shyam’s effort drew applause not only from local people but also from officials, public representatives and many others. The book contains the details of welfare schemes, benefits given and names of officials (with their phone number and email id) to be contacted at the district, mandal and village levels.
On why he thought about compiling such a book, Mr. Shyam said that a newly elected MLA from Kodad, N. Padmavathi, had raised the issue of not having any kind of booklet on government welfare schemes during a district review meeting. She complained that even public representatives did not have proper knowledge of welfare schemes. Coupled with this was another incident which made him realise how people suffer because of their lack of knowledge of welfare schemes.
He said his close friend’s father had died in Nadigudem mandal headquarters, Shyam’s native place, but the family was not eligible for any benefits under ‘Abhaya hastham’ because he did not pay Rs. 375 as premium for insurance as they were unaware of the scheme. Though the deceased also has a bank account under Jandhan Yojana Scheme, Mr. Shyam said he did not make any transactions from the account because of which he lost out on some benefits.
“I thought neither the common man nor elected representatives had knowledge about welfare schemes, which motivated me to compile the handbook,” he said. He further said that Chief Planning Officer P. Nageshwar Rao and Deputy Director M. Mohan Rao in the planning office had also provided useful inputs.
MLAs N. Padmavathi, Vemula Veeresham and Gadari Kishore hailed the efforts of Mr. Shyam while releasing the book in their respective constituencies.
So far, he has distributed 400 books.
