The Anantapur Municipal Corporation is leaving no stone unturned to ensure payment of pension to all eligible persons. The process is being streamlined by addressing the twin issues of wrong Aadhaar linkages and lack of ration card linkage.
Municipal Commissioner P. Prasanthi told The Hindu that thanks to social audit in rural areas, the records were clean and there were very few ineligible persons, but like in other urban areas in the State, the main problem facing the AMC is correcting the database.
There were about 24,300 pensioners in corporation limits, and the list was growing slowly. Ward volunteers were going about their task meticulously by identifying persons who were illegally drawing the money of some other persons due to wrong Aadhaar information seeding. “Ground-level work for identifying eligible pensioners is going on smoothly as there is one government employee for every 500 population in a ward,” Ms. Prasanthi said.
Many corporators and political leaders are putting pressure on officials to continue pension to some ineligible persons and in such cases, the profile of each individual was being thoroughly scrutinised. Not surprisingly, a majority of petitions received at the ‘Spandana’ programme are related to pension followed by housing and house site pattas. Since no house sites can be given in urban areas, 23,800 applications were verified and all eligible were promised houses under Prime Minister Awas Yojana.
The total amount for making pension payments increased by ₹18 lakh in October compared with September and could go up further this month with new categories added.
Encroachers warned
On encroachments, Ms. Prasanthi said she would continue the campaign of demolitions if the violators failed to fall in line. Next in line are illegal extension of business premises and unauthorised occupation of parking lots by running businesses or using for other purposes. She urged people to bring such issues to the notice of the AMC, but not civil disputes.
About 2,000 grievances have been received since November 1 and all of them were disposed of. Ward volunteers and ward secretariat employees were made to attend the Spandana programme to get an idea about the nature of grievances. They are also being trained to tackle the issues, the official added.
