- Aged people await Aasara
- Not only 57 years old even 65 year old people are not getting it
Hyderabad, Velugu: The much publicized old age pension scheme Aasara seems to have to give any helping hand to the needy as they have been waiting for the last three years and that no hope in sight. In order to help those who crossed 57 years, the State government when it came to power second time announced the scheme and there ended the matter. The implementation of the scheme has been getting postponed with no new pension is given to anyone. By stopping the new pensions Rs.7thousand crores of amount is said to have been saved by the government. The process is ending at just taking the applications from the needy. The TRS government in its manifesto promised that Aasara pensions would not be confined to only those who crossed 65 years of age but also to those who crossed 57 years of age would get the pensions. But it is a typical denial of justice to both the age groups. During the last three years there has been a massive increase in the number of those who applied for Asara pensions including divyangas, single woman, widows and other groups with different ailments.
It is a fact that the details of those who crossed were taken during the panchayat elections held in 2019 and a list of 6.70 lakh eligible people was also prepared excluding Hyderabad where the eligible people for the pension was estimated as more than two lakh. For all of them it has been a case of unending agony and fading hopes as the government miserably failed to help the aged, except taking applications from them. There has been criticism that the pension was announced just to win the panchayat elections at that time. In that backdrop the government invited applications for Asara pensions from August 15th to 31st 9.50 lakh people applied for it. No verification of the applications is started even after the deadline ended one month ago. But responding to the appeal of MIM MLA the government gave another chance to apply for the pensions.
If the government is serious about giving pensions to those who crossed, the people demand that it should immediately start verification of the lakhs of applications already submitted. The government has proudly announced that those who have crossed 57 years will be given pensions but ironically it failed to give pensions to those who crossed 65 years. Just to reduce the agony of people it has implemented the scheme in some areas including Huzurabad where by elections are being held. It seems that the government is in the habit of implementing the scheme or announcing it wherever there are electons..Dubbaka and Nagarjunasagar are the latest examples. The people have come to a realization that unless there are electons there will not be any new pensions.
