Singareni Retired Employees Association has requested Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao to provide medicines to the needy retired employees of the Singareni Collieries Company Limited living in different parts of the State as most of them have been living in penury in the absence of pension worth of any mention.
In a letter addressed to the Chief Minister, president of the association D. Ramchander Rao has stated that a majority of the coal mine pensioners in the country are getting paltry pension starting from ₹350 a month. He stated that the number of Singareni pensioners is about 80,000 and about half of them are getting only up to ₹5,000 a month with a majority even among the half getting less that ₹2,000 a month.
As a result, they were not in a position to meet even their basic medical expenses. Mr. Ramchander Rao said and added that most of the pensioners live in Hyderabad, Khammam, Warangal and Karimnagar and are suffering age-related, diabetic, blood pressure and other ailments.
Stating that they have provision to collect monthly medicines from Singareni dispensaries and hospitals at Kothagudem, Godavarikhani, Bhupalapalli, Srirampur, Mandamarri and a few other places, he said, and added that it is getting increasingly difficult for those living in other places to collect the medicines due to health problems, old-age and commuting expenses. He requested the Chief Minister to instruct the Singareni authorities to provide medicines to pensioners living away from where the company’s hospitals and dispensaries are located.
He stated that All India Coal Pensioners Association that organised a protest in Delhi seeking revision of pension for retired employees of coal mines on July 22 is organising one more protest on December 5 to press for a decision by the Coal Ministry to revise pension as Coal Mines Pension Fund Organisation is not empowered to revise pension on its own in spite of a provision as per the Ministry’s March 1998 notification to revise pension every three years.
