Cash crunch now hits welfare pensioners

Ongole (Prakasam district): G Venkata Reddy, a 76-year-old welfare pensioner from Mundlamuru village was disappointed to find the Vayojana Vidya Kendram, where pensions are distributed regularly, was not opened for the fourth day on Friday.

He needs to go to Ongole for treatment to his ailments at RIMS and bring medicine. V Guravamma, 60, joined Venkata Reddy later, and said that she was waiting for the pension for the last 15 days to meet some needs. Kandimalla Peddammayi, 80, from Chimakurthy, was a little happy that she received the pension at last on Friday.

The cash crunch in the state has hit the welfare schemes very badly in May. Of the 46.9 lakh of welfare pensioners in the state of Andhra Pradesh, only 32.25 lakh pensioners received the money this month and the remaining 30 per cent are in waiting. The DRDA (District Rural Development Agency) project directors, who should see that panchayat secretaries and other pension disbursement officials get the money are pressurising the bankers to divert all the money for pensions but are unable to meet the demand.

The department of rural development released 46,89,715 pensions across the state for May 2018 under various welfare schemes. It is a regular practice that 90 per cent of the pensions are disbursed by 2nd day of every month, irrespective of the holidays. But this month, even after four days, the average disbursement of these pensions is around just 70 per cent.

The Chittoor district tops the list with better disbursement of around 80 per cent while Visakhapatnam district at the bottom with around 55 per cent. All over the state, the banks in the urban areas are able to supply the cash as per the demand but the branches in rural areas given up on the second day itself.

In Prakasam district, the urban areas like Ongole, Kondepi, Chirala, PC Palli, Marripudi, Yerragondapalem, Martur Kandukur, Chimakurthy, Markapur and other areas, the panchayat secretaries are able to disburse 80 to 90 per cent pensions by Friday. But still only 1 per cent of the pensions were disbursed in Kandukur rural and Gudluru mandals, 4 per cent at Naguluppalapadu and 8 per cent on Mundlamuru, 14 per cent in Talluru and 16 per cent in Chirala rural areas.

Nallamala Sudhakar, panchayat secretary for Kovuru, Pandalapadu and Jillellamudi waited all day on Friday at Kandukur SBI main branch along with his other colleagues to receive cash to disburse 560 pensions under his panchayats. The bank officials asked them to wait until the surrounding SBI branches also close their business and shift the money to main branch to withdraw the same at around 7 pm. He said that the government wants them to disburse all pensions by 5th of every month at any cost.

M S Murali, project director of Prakasam DRDA, said that the district collector Vadarevu Vinay Chand had already ordered the bankers to divert all cash deposits in the banks for disbursement of pensions.

He said that the SBI, Andhra Bank and Syndicate Bank officials are struggling to arrange the money for 3.30 lakh pensions since last week of April. He said that some banks are gathering the money deposited by the customers all over the district to address the demand at some branches while some banks like Andhra Bank are even trying to get from other districts like Visakhapatnam. 

By Naresh Nandm