an assessment of social pension schemes in … · 4 considerable budgetary allocation is involved...
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Table of Contents Executive summary .................................................................................................................... 3
List of Acronyms ....................................................................................................................... 9
List of Tables ........................................................................................................................... 10
List of Figures .......................................................................................................................... 11
1 Karnataka State Profile ..................................................................................................... 12
1.1 Demography of Karnataka: ....................................................................................... 12
1.2 State Income .............................................................................................................. 13
1.3 Ration card holders in Karnataka .............................................................................. 14
1.4 Below the Poverty Line Estimates ............................................................................ 15
1.5 Old Age population in Karnataka.............................................................................. 16
1.6 Widows in Karnataka ................................................................................................ 18
1.7 Disabled people in Karnataka ................................................................................... 20
1.7.1 Working Status of Disabled people ................................................................... 21
1.8 Destitute Women in Karnataka ................................................................................. 23
1.9 Aaadhar Card Enrolment in Karnataka ..................................................................... 24
2 Social Security Measures in Karnataka: Overview to Schemes ....................................... 27
2.1 Old Age Pension Scheme: ......................................................................................... 30
2.2 Sandhya Suraksha Yojana: ........................................................................................ 34
2.3 Destitute Widow Pension Scheme ............................................................................ 37
2.4 Physically Handicapped Pension Scheme ................................................................. 40
2.5 Manaswini Scheme ................................................................................................... 43
2.6 Mythri Scheme: ......................................................................................................... 45
3 Discussion ......................................................................................................................... 48
4 Conclusion ........................................................................................................................ 53
Reference: ................................................................................................................................ 54
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Executive summary
Non-contributory pensions, popularly known as “Social pensions”, are a tool used by
governments to ensure against – or at least alleviate poverty through regular cash transfers to
destitute elderly, widows and disabled people who have no regular means of subsistence
from their own sources of income or through financial support from family members or other
sources. These social pensions are referred as non contributory pensions because
entitlements are not based on employment or on a record of payroll contributions. Social
pension serves various objectives like poverty alleviation, consumption smoothening and
insurance in respect of ageing population. The optimal distribution theory is based on the
idea that the elderly need assistance in terms of poverty alleviation and pension helps by
transferring resources from a younger generation to the older generation. It is also generally
assumed that the elderly are less productive than the younger generation and, therefore,
should retire so that there is continuity in deploying efficient means of production. The
magnitude of the woes of persons with disabilities is vast and its impact on the individual,
family and community is severe. The most vulnerable groups among the persons with
disabilities include very young children, women and the aged with disabilities, and the
magnitude is multiplied if the disabled people are from a family belonging to low income
group. For women, destitution in form of widowhood, divorce, or separation from the
husband, leaves most of them economically disadvantaged and they face the problem of
social insecurity and loneliness, raising children, etc. In a socially conservative country like
India, transgender communities face a much more daunting, tedious and uphill battle. Thus,
along with other assistance programs, financial assistance in the form of monthly pension
will help these vulnerable sections of the society in meeting their livelihood requirements.
The Directorate of Social Security and Pensions (SSP), Revenue Department, Govt. of
Karnataka, has been implementing six schemes for poor people in the categories of old age,
widows, destitute women, disabled and transgender. There are two old age pension schemes
namely, Centre and state co-sponsored Old Age Pension scheme and a fully state sponsored
Sandhya Suraksha Yojana (SSY) scheme aimed to help eligible elderly citizens by
providing them with pensions, Destitute Widow Pension Scheme for the empowering
widows, Physically Handicapped Pension Scheme to provide financial assistance to disabled
people, Manaswini scheme for the destitute, divorced and unmarried women aged above 40
years, and Mythri scheme for transgender.
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Considerable budgetary allocation is involved in running these schemes. Sandhya Suraksha
Yojana Scheme, a State initiative, with highest number of beneficiaries among the 6 schemes
has incurred an expenditure of Rs 1167 crores to State’s exchequer, in percentage terms it is
0.14% of the GSDP for the year 2015-16. Destitute Widow Pension scheme incurred an
expenditure of about Rs.925.57 crores, and Disability Pension Scheme with about 8.28 lakh
beneficiaries has incurred Rs.804 crores. In sum, Government of Karnataka has spent Rs
3548.16 crore to provide financial assistance to the total of 53.84 lakh beneficiaries in these
six schemes. This amounts to 0.45% of the State GDP in the year 2015-16. Due to the
increased spending by the state government in the social assistance sector, in the last 5 years,
nearly 21.93 lakh new beneficiaries have been enrolled in these schemes. In 2015-16 alone,
8.35 lakh new beneficiaries have been enrolled in these flagship schemes. In the last 3 years,
nearly 5 lakh new beneficiaries have been added under these schemes every year. For 2015-
16, there were a total of 53.84 lakh beneficiaries receiving pension under these six pension
schemes.
A significant number of the elderly population continues to participate in the work
force as self-employed. The situation implies that in many cases they do not have any kind of
financial support from the next to kin and have to manage their own financial needs. In this
regard, the present practice of providing old age pension by the government targeting the old
age population in the BPL category can be viewed as a helping hand for the aged. This
would infuse confidence, self-esteem and a sense of social security in them. As February
2016, the OAP scheme covers 7.2 Lakh beneficiaries across Karnataka. With total number of
beneficiaries under the OAP & SSY scheme put together accounting to 29.32 lakh
pensioners, it can be inferred that these two schemes are well targeted and, the schemes are
in active demand among the old age population in Karnataka.
Sandhya Suraksha Yojane scheme is another old age pension programme in
Karnataka implemented by the State Government since 2007. The scheme is fully sponsored
by the state. The purpose of the scheme is to provide financial assistance through cash
transfers of pension amount Rs 500 pm to the elderly people aged above 65 years. With
similar features to OAP, SSY intends to cover a larger section of elderly poor who may not
be covered under OAP. While the benefit amount and age criterion are the same as in the
case of OAP scheme, the difference lies in income eligibility. Pension under SSY scheme
can be availed by elderly persons earning up to Rs. 20,000 per annum and not availing
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pension from any other social scheme. The intended beneficiaries are old age people
employed in occupational groups such as Small farmers, Marginal farmers, Agricultural
laborers, Weavers, fishermen, laborers from unorganized sectors (excluding Building and
other construction workers). As of Feb 2016, there were 22 lakh beneficiaries in the state
availing pension under the scheme. Within a short time frame of 4 years, the size of the
beneficiaries has doubled from 11 lakh in 2011-12 to 22 lakh beneficiaries in 2015-16. While
OAP focuses on the poor elderly under the BPL category, SSY scheme extends the coverage
to include elderly people in the marginally BPL category.
In 2009, the Indira Gandhi National Widow Pension Scheme (IGNWPS) was
introduced by Government of India under the National Social Assistance Programme
(NSAP). At the time of this research, the scheme was meant to benefit widows aged above
18 years, below poverty line, whose husband is legally dead. The pension amount of Rs 500
pm will be paid till she remarries or her children starts supporting her or her income limit
crosses limit as above or till her death. While IGNWPS is a recent scheme, Destitute Widow
Pension Scheme (DWP) which is a state government’s initiative with similar features to
assist destitute widows in the BPL category, has been in operation since 1984.
There were 15.43 lakh widow pensioners in the state as in 2015-16. In the last one year
alone, nearly 1, 91,000 beneficiaries have been enrolled in the scheme. The DSSP statistics
shows the number of new beneficiaries being added in to the scheme Year-on-Year basis,
since last 5 years, and as per the same more than 1 lakh new beneficiaries have been added in
the scheme every year. This rate of growth is the illustration of popularity of the scheme.
Apart from the flagship Destitute Widow Pension scheme, Government of Karnataka has
taken initiatives for the economic wellbeing of the destitute widows. Udyogini is one such
innovative scheme started in the year 1997-98. This scheme empowers women by providing
loans through banks and other financial institutions. Its benefits are available to all women,
however, widows and destitute women are given special preferences such as relaxing the
income limit, and loans are provided at subsidized rate. There are also various training
programmes conducted to impart skills in assisting self-employment and wage employment.
In Karnataka, as per census 2011, there were 1.32 million differently-abled people. This
accounts to approximately 5 % of the total differently-abled population in India. Among all
the age groups, the proportion of men with disabilities was higher as compared to women.
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Nearly half of the disabled were of age less than 30 and only one-fourth of disabled persons
were of age 50 or more. The total number of persons receiving physically handicapped
pensions in the state was 8.28 lakh in 2015-16. There were 4.84 lakh beneficiaries with
disability below 75% and 3.43 lakh beneficiaries with disability above 75% were receiving
pension under this scheme as on 2015-16. The State has implemented many schemes for the
benefit of disabled people in the areas of rehabilitation, education, skill development and
employment opportunities.
The state government introduced the Manaswini scheme in August 2013 with the
objective of providing financial assistance to poor unmarried, separated and divorced women
aged above 40 years. Under this scheme, a monthly pension of Rs 500 is given to the
beneficiaries. In the first year of implementation, nearly 12000 beneficiaries were enrolled in
the scheme. In the last two years, nearly 30,000 beneficiaries were added to the scheme year-
on-year, counting to 73000 beneficiaries as on year 2015-16. Of the four revenue divisions,
Mysore has highest number of beneficiaries with 36% of total beneficiaries, followed by
Bengaluru division with 30% of total beneficiaries (or) nearly 22,000 beneficiaries as on
year 2015-16.
Mythri Scheme, another state government initiative, was started on August 2013 to
help transgender community and bring them to the mainstream of the society. Under this
scheme, members of sexuality minorities who are aged above 25 years will be entitled for a
monthly pension of Rs.500. The latest census of the KSAPS estimated the numbers of
transgender in State at about 24,500. In the first year of the commencement of the scheme,
only 215 beneficiaries enrolled in the scheme, but it has grown to 1021 beneficiaries as on
2015-16. However, these enrollment numbers seems to be meagre in comparison to the
KSAPS figures on transgender.
Leakage in the pension administration system could take many forms including the
incidence of duplicates in the administrative records, fictitious or ghost pensioners (either
due to fake entries in the administrative records or the non-suspension or continuation for
those who have died or moved or are no longer eligible), and through bribes or theft. In the
absence of computerized records, the current requirement of annual physical verification of
the pensioner at the treasury office is not sufficient to check the incidence of fake pensioners.
Thus, a well-designed and computerized system for application processing, record-keeping
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and monitoring becomes essential. Another important problem is the delay in the disbursal of
pensions. Though it is recognized that existing banking network is not as wider as postal
network; hence they may face limitations in reaching out to the remote and far off villages,
Reserve Bank of India has taken many steps to redefine banking in India. Payment banking
is one such initiative from RBI. The Reserve Bank expects payment banks to target India’s
migrant laborers, low-income households and small businesses, offering savings accounts
and remittance services with a low transaction cost.
If the household income is taken into account, as per the present eligibility criteria of Rs.
12000 PA in rural areas and Rs. 17000 PA in urban areas for sanction of widow and
disability pension, many households become ineligible. In the present context, where that
the implementation of NREGP which guarantees a minimum of 100 days of employment per
annum and the revised minimum wage of Rs.224 per day in Karnataka according to the
Minimum Wages Act, as on March 2016. Therefore, it is unlikely that the annual income of
a household would be less than income limits criteria of the scheme, even if there is one
worker in the household, thus fixing such an income limit as eligibility for sanction of
pension appears to be unrealistic. State government shall contemplate an upward revision of
the income criteria for sanctioning widow and disability pensions. Also, annual income limit
criteria cannot be viewed in isolation. The indebtedness of the household, the source and
purpose of debt will have a bearing on household income. If the household incurs a debt
from a private source for health or consumption purpose or even for investment on
agriculture, there may be no returns or the rate of return is uncertain, which would make it
difficult for the household to repay it. The expenditure pattern, especially on medical
expenses or education or liquor/gambling, should also be taken into account to judge
whether the income puts the household on a sound footing in economic terms. Similarly, the
monthly pension amount shall be revised every two to three years and changed every six
month based on inflation – in the same manner as is done for salaries of government
servants.
The Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) established a program in 2009
called Aadhaar as a method for providing identification to the marginalized residents of
India. The purpose of the identification project was to promote greater social and financial
inclusion for all residents in the formal economy of India. By providing a clear proof of
identity, the UID number also facilitates entry for poor and underprivileged residents into the
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formal banking system, and the opportunity to avail services provided by the government
and the private sector.
The above discussion has certain policy implications. The progressive step of RBI issuing
license to setting Payment Banks is a welcome feature. However, facilitating financial
literacy is to move to payment system through banking network. Computerization of data,
introducing online application processing and monitoring systems needs to be expedited to
improve the efficiency of the pension administrative system. Policy regarding the income
criteria for the sanction of pension needs to be revised upwards without any delay so that the
deserving potential beneficiaries could be brought under the purview of pension. Lastly,
monthly pension amount shall be revised every two to three years and changed every six
month based on inflation. Given the increasing acceptance of Aadhaar, linking Aadhaar
number with the pension accounts has its own benefits. The Aadhaar seeding can help in
identifying fake beneficiaries and detect fraudulent practices by false claimant. In order to
make the pension disbursal system corruption-free and transparent, government shall link
social security scheme beneficiaries’ bank accounts with their Aadhaar card and make their
names public
The steady growth in active pensioners in the state is a step in the right direction, since
projections of elderly populations and their projected socio‐economic status predict higher
dependency ratios for elderly population in the coming years. This is of serious concern as
most of the disabled persons were found to be very young. It also indicates that government
policy and programmes should aim at early mainstreaming of these young persons with
disability for a long-run solution to the problem. The fight for access to education and health,
legal recognition, increased awareness, access to social welfare schemes and end to
harassment requires social mobilization of the transgender community. There is a urgent
need for a government-conducted transgender census to identify targeted beneficiaries to be
enrolled in the scheme. Also, government should take necessary steps in guaranteeing rights
and entitlements, reservations in education, legal aid, skill development and create
employment opportunities for transgender.
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List of Acronyms
BPL Below the Poverty Line
DSSP Directorate of Social Security and Pensions
DWP Destitute Widow Pension
GoK Government of Karnataka
GSDP Gross State Domestic Product
Fig Figure
IGNOAPS Indra Gandhi National Old Age Pension Scheme
IGNWPS Indira Gandhi National Widow Pension Scheme
KSAPS Karnataka State AIDS Prevention Society
N .A. Not Available
NPHH Non Priority Households
NGO Non-Governmental Organization
NREGP National Rural Employment Guarantee Program
OAP Old Age Pension
pm per month
PA Per Annum
PHP Physically Handicapped Pension
PHH Priority Households
RBI Reserve Bank of India
RC Ration Card
SSY Sandhya Suraksha Yojana
Y-o-Y Year-on-Year
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List of Tables Table No. Title of the Table Page No.
Table1.0.1 : Revenue Divisions of Karnataka 12
Table1.1.1 : Demographic Features of Karnataka 13
Table1.2.1 : Comparison of Karnataka’s GSDP with India’s GDP 14
Table1.3.1 : Districts with highest number of PHH RCs 14
Table 1.4.1 : All India and Karnataka Poverty Line details 16
Table1.5.1 : Demographics of Elderly Population 17
Table 1.6.1 : Age distribution of Widows in Karnataka 19
Table 1.7.1 : Disabled people in Karnataka 21
Table 1.8.1 Age Wise Distribution of destitute women in Karnataka 24
Table1.9.1 : Aadhaar Enrollments in Karnataka till June 2016 25
Table 2.0.1 : Social expenditure Vs. Percentage of State GSDP 28
Table 2.0.2 : Physical Progress in the six schemes 28
Table 2.0.3 : Growth in Beneficiaries of Old Schemes 28
Table 2.0.4 : Growth in Beneficiaries of New Schemes 28
Table 2.1.1 : Central and State Contribution in OAP Scheme 30
Table 2.1.2 : Annual growth in OAP beneficiaries 31
Table 2.1.3 : Revenue division-wise distribution of OAP beneficiaries 32
Table 2.2.1 : Annual growth in SSY beneficiaries 34
Table 2.2.2 : Revenue division-wise new enrollments in SSY 34
Table 2.2.3 : Revenue division-wise distribution of SSY beneficiaries 35
Table 2.3.1 : Annual growth in DWP beneficiaries 38
Table 2.3.2 : Revenue division-wise new enrollments in DWP 38
Table 2.3.3 : Revenue division-wise distribution of DWPS Beneficiaries 38
Table 2.4.1 : Annual growth in PHP beneficiaries 40
Table 2.4.2 : Revenue division-wise distribution of PHP Beneficiaries 41
Table 2.5.1 : Annual growth in Manaswini beneficiaries 43
Table 2.5.2 : Revenue division-wise new enrollments in Manaswini scheme 43
Table 2.5.3 : Revenue division-wise distribution of beneficiaries under
Manaswini
44
Table 2.6.1 : Annual growth in beneficiaries in Mythri scheme 46
Table: 2.6.2 : Revenue division-wise distribution of beneficiaries in Mythri
Scheme
46
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List of Figures
Figure No. Title of the Figure Page No.
Figure 1.3.1 : Ration Card Holders in Karnataka 15
Figure 1.5.1 : Demographics of Elderly Population 17
Figure.1.6.1 : Age distribution of Widows in Karnataka 18
Figure 1.6.2 : Age wise distribution of widows-Rural and urban comparison 18
Figure 1.7.1 : Total Disabled worker 22
Figure 1.7.2 : Disabled Main worker 22
Figure 1.7.3 : Disabled Marginal worker 22
Figure 1.8.1 : Age wise Distribution of destitute women in Karnataka 24
Figure 1.9.1 : Number of Aadhaars in Karnataka till June 2016 25
Figure 2.1.1 : Percentage of OAP beneficiaries in 2015-16 31
Figure 2.1.2 : New Enrollments in OAP in 5 years 31
Figure 2.2.1 : Percentage of SSY beneficiaries in 2015-16 35
Figure 2.2.2 : New Enrollments in SSY Scheme in 5 years 35
Figure 2.3.1 : Percentage of DWP beneficiaries in 2015-16 37
Figure 2.3.2 : New Enrollments in DWPS in 5 years 37
Figure 2.4.1 : Percentage of beneficiaries in PHP in 2015-16 41
Figure 2.4.2 : New Enrollments in PHP in last 5 years 41
Figure 2.5.1 : Percentage of Manaswini beneficiaries in 2015-16 44
Figure 2.5.2 : New Enrollments in Manaswini in 5 years 44
Figure 2.6.1 : Revenue division-wise total beneficiaries in Mythri as on 2015-16 54
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1 Karnataka State Profile
Karnataka, India’s eighth largest state in terms of geographical area (191791 sq.km)
is home to 6.11 crore people (2011 Census). The state’s population has grown by 15.7%
during the last decade, while its population density has risen from 276 in 2001 to 319 in
2011 indicating an increase of about 15.6%. Karnataka State has been divided into four
Revenue divisions, 49 sub-divisions, 30 districts, 177 taluks for administrative purposes. The
jurisdictions of the Revenue Divisions are given in the table.
Table1.0.1: Revenue Divisions of Karnataka.
Name of the
Revenue Division
Location of
the RDC
Districts under Jurisdiction
Bengaluru Division
Bengaluru
Bengaluru urban, Bengaluru rural,
Chikkaballapura, Davangere, Kolar,
Ramanagara, Shimoga, Tumakur,
Chitradurga.
Mysore Division
Mysore
Mysore, Udupi, Mandya, Dakshina
Kannada, Chikkamangaluru,
Chamarajnagar, Kodadu, Hassan.
Belgaum Division
Belgaum
Bagalkote, Belgaum, Bijapur, Dharwad,
Gadag, Haveri, Uttara Kannada.
Gulbarga Division
Gulbarga Bellary, Bidar,Gulbarga,Koppal, Raichur,
Yadgir
Source: Karnataka State Profile-2011
1.1 Demography of Karnataka:
As per the 2011 census data, in Karnataka there are 61.09 million persons, comprising
30.96 million male and 30.12 million female population. With the nation’s population being
121.01 billion, the share of Karnataka’s population in the country is 5.04 %. The total area
of Karnataka is 191791 sq. km, which is 6.26 % of India. The density of population is 276
persons live in one square kilometer area, which is lower than the national average of 334
Persons per sq. km. The decadal growth rate of 17.51 whereas national rate is 21.34. The sex
ratio of Karnataka is 973 females per 1000 males. The all India figure is 933, which is less
by 32 points.
Another characteristic of the population, which reflects on social development, is the
literacy rate. The literacy rate of the Karnataka is 75.36 % as against the all India average of
74.04 percent. The male literacy rate has gone up by 6 percent from 76.1 % 2001 to 82.47 %
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in 2011. Similarly, the female literacy rate has gone up by 11% from 56.9% in 2001 to
68.08% in 2011. Level of urbanization is an indicator of development. Out of total
population of Karnataka, 38.67% (or) 23.6 million people live in urban centers. The urban
population in the last 10 years has increased by 38.67 percent. Sex Ratio in urban regions of
Karnataka was 963 females per 1000 males. For child (0-6) sex ratio the figure for urban
region stood at 946 girls per 1000 boys. Average Literacy rate in urban areas was 85.78
percent in which males were 90.04% literate while female literacy stood at 77.97%.
Table1.1.1: Demographic Features of Karnataka
Demographic Features 2001 2011
Total population 52,850,562 61,095,297
Male population 26,898,918 30,966,657
Female population 25,951,644 30,128,640
Sex ratio 965 973
Density of population 276 319
Literacy rate general in % 67 75.36
Male literacy rate in % 76.1 82.47
Female literacy rate in % 56.9 68.08
% of population living in
urban places
36 28
Source: Census of India 2011
1.2 State Income
The Advance estimate of the Gross State Domestic Product (GSDP) estimates of
state for the year 2015-16 (with 2011-12 as new base year, replacing 2004-05) is expected to
grow at 6.2% and reach Rs7,80,805 crore from Rs7,34,988 crore last year. In the new series,
with 2011-12 as base year, the GSDP estimates are at market prices. Nevertheless, the state
continues to be in the league of middle income states. The level of per capita income at
constant (2011- 12) prices for the year 2015-16 is estimated to reach Rs.1,10,624 as
compared to Rs.1,05,350 achieved in 2014-15 (GoK 2016). Year 2014-15 saw the highest
growth rate in the last 5 years, with GSDP growing Y-o-Y at 7.8 % compared to nation’s
GDP growing at 7.2% Y-o-Y from previous year.
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Table1.2.1: Comparison of Karnataka’s GSDP with India’s GDP
Year GSDP
(Rs. crore)
Growth Rate of
GSDP (%)
GDP
(Rs. crore)
Growth Rate of
GDP (%)
2011-12 602655 N.A. 8736039 N.A
2012-13 637893 5.8 9226879 5.6
2013-14 681889 6.9 9839434 6.6
2014-15 734988 7.8 10552151 7.2
2015-16 780805 6.2 11350962 7.6
Source: Economic Survey of Karnataka (2015)
1.3 Ration card holders in Karnataka
While it is voluntary to obtain ration cards in India, an Indian ration card is mainly
used for purchasing subsidized food and fuel (LPG, kerosene, wheat and rice) through the
Public Distribution System (PDS). It is an important subsistence tool for the poor, providing
proof of identity and a connection with government databases. Eligibility for the Antyodaya,
BPL and APL ration cards is based on the economic status of the family. It is issued one per
family by the state government. It has three categories – extreme poverty level (Antyodaya),
below poverty line (BPL) and above poverty line (APL). These poverty lines are defined by
the Planning Commission of India every few years based on data collection and analysis
from various sources. Till recently, the ration cards were categorized as BPL and APL. But
the new Food Security Act has done away these two categories and introduced priority and
non-priority household categories. As on April 2016, there were 1.31 crore census
households in Karnataka. The number of PHH and Non-PHH ration cards issued were 1.02
crore and 27.09 lakh respectively. The chart below, shows that number of households with
PHH ration cards outnumbered the number of households with NPHH ration cards, in all the
four revenue divisions of Karnataka. This shall show that a large number of households are
still under BPL category and depend on Public Distribution System for the subsidized food
and fuel.
Table1.3.1: Districts with highest number of PHH RCs
District Name PHH RCs
Mysore 594895
Belgaum 843083
Gulbarga 449666
Tumkur 574663
Source: Food, Civil Supplies & Consumer Affairs Dept. (Gok.)
15
0100000200000300000400000500000600000
Mysore Division
PHH RCs
NPHH RCs
0
100000
200000
300000
400000
500000
BA
LLA
RI
BID
AR
KA
LAB
UR
AG
I
KO
PP
AL
YAD
GIR
RA
ICH
UR
Gulbarga division
PHH RCs
NPHH RCs0100000200000300000400000500000600000
Bengaluru division
PHH RCs
NPHH RCs
Figure 1.3.1: Ration Card Holders in Karnataka (as on April 2016)
Source: Food, Civil Supplies & Consumer Affairs Dept. (GoK.)
The above tables show the districts with highest number PHH RCs issued, within their
respective revenue division. Belgaum district has the highest number of PHH RCs issued
among all the districts of Karnataka, followed by Mysore with 5.94 lakh PHH RCs as on
April 2016.
1.4 Below the Poverty Line Estimates
Identification of urban and rural poor households is a necessary condition for more
effectively targeting the beneficiaries under various poverty alleviation programmes being
implemented by the Central and the State Governments. The individual or family income of
which is not adequate to ensure them the minimum requirements of life (e.g. nutrition,
clothing and shelter) is stated to be the poverty line. The all India poverty line is the per
capital per month expenditure that corresponds to the all India poverty ratio. It also indicates
the monthly per capita among rural and urban people in different states of India.
0
200000
400000
600000
800000
1000000
Belgaum Division
PHH RCs
NPHH RCs
16
Table 1.4.1: All India and Karnataka Poverty Line details
Year
State /
Union
Territory
Rural Urban Combined
Number
of
persons
(Lakh)
% of
persons
Poverty
line
(Rs)
Number
of
persons
(Lakh)
% of
persons
Povert
y line
(Rs)
Number
of
persons
(Lakh)
% of
persons
2011-
12
Karnataka 9280 24.53 902 3696 15.25 1089 12976 20.91
All India 216658 25.7 816 53125 13.7 1000 269783 21.92
Source: RBI, 2013.
The total number of people below the poverty line in the country has been estimated
at 269.7 million people in 2011-12, of which 216.5 million people reside in rural areas,
while, 53.12 million people live in urban areas. In Karnataka, out of 12.97 million people
below the poverty line, nearly 9.2 million people were living in rural areas and 3.6 million
people in urban center. The state's poverty percentage is lower than the national average.
These poverty lines would vary from state to state because of inter-state price differentials.
The poverty line was calculated on the basis of a monthly per capita income of Rs.902 for
rural areas and Rs.1089 for urban areas. Thus, for a family of five, the state’s poverty line in
terms of consumption expenditure would amount to about Rs. 4510 per month in rural areas
and Rs. 5,445 per month in urban areas. Poverty in India is a hurdle for economic prosperity.
The Governments at the state levels should expedite measures to improve the income level
of the people.
1.5 Old Age population in Karnataka
The number of elderly in India is rising rapidly. India’s elderly population is estimated at
10 crore in 2011, and is projected to reach 20 crore by 2030. The proportion of elderly
persons in the total population is expected to increase from 8.3 percent in 2011 to 12.4
percent in 2026. In this context, a few important characteristics need to be considered. In
2010, about two-third of the elderly lived in villages and nearly half were of poor socio-
economic status. Half of the elderly are dependents mainly due to widowhood, divorce or
separation and a large number of these are females (Singh, 2013).
While the shift from a young to an older age structure reflects a successful record in health
improvements in the country, the fact that individuals are reaching the older ages in
unprecedented numbers and with varying needs and resources is likely to pose many policy
challenges arising out of increasing proportions of elderly and decreasing proportions of
children. This trend leads to a decreasing support base combined with higher levels of old
17
0
10,00,000
20,00,000
30,00,000
40,00,000
Demographics of elderly population
Male
Female
age dependency. Fewer working age persons supporting more number of elders, greater
likelihood of experiencing the loss of one's spouse, especially for women, and low levels of
literacy are some of the sources of vulnerability that are faced in old age.
With the number of older persons in general increasing and highest elderly population in the
age group of 60-64, increased longevity of women has jointly resulted in higher numbers of
female population in the age group of 60 years and above. According to census 2011, there
were 57, 91,000 people in the above 60 years age group. In the entire age bracket above the
60 years age group, there were more numbers in female population than men. The highest
numbers were found in the age group of 60-64 years where there were 10, 65,422 elderly
women in Karnataka during the census period.
Table1.5.1: Demographics of Elderly Population
Figure 1.5.1: Demographics of Elderly Population
Source: Karnataka Census-2011.
While the number of older persons in general is increasing, the increase among the oldest old
of 80 years and above, who will have special needs for health and support, is particularly
sharp. Further, women constitute a major portion of this increase as they live longer than
men, particularly after 75 years of age, as we can see, out of 11, 49,736 people in the age
Karnataka Census-2011 data
Age-group Persons Male Female
60-64 20,60,052 9,94,630 10,65,422
65-69 15,20,119 7,23,687 7,96,432
70-74 10,61,125 5,10,419 5,50,706
75-79 5,24,426 2,49,834 2,74,592
80+ 6,25,310 2,68,502 3,56,808
total 57,91,032 27,47,072 30,43,960
Source: Karnataka Census-2011.
18
0
50000
100000
150000
200000
250000
300000
20
-24
30
-34
40
-44
50
-54
60
-64
70
-74
80
+
Urban
Rural
0
200000
400000
600000
20
-24
30
-34
40
-44
50
-54
60
-64
70
-74
80
+
Widows in Karnataka
Total-Females
group of 75+ years of age, there were 1, 13,064 more elderly women than the total number
of elderly men in that age group i.e. elderly women formed 54% of the total population in
that age group.
A growing older population implies the need for a higher quantity and quality of
geriatric services, arrangements of income security and improved quality of life in general.
Studies point out that low-income household cannot cope with increased dependency
because they work in informal labour markets and have fewer work opportunities at a time
when there will be fewer children for parents to count on in their old age. The need for social
pension payments and resulting financial outlays to meet the increasing old age dependency
and decreasing support base becomes more important. Further, older persons and their
families will have to deal with challenges arising out of increased longevity.
1.6 Widows in Karnataka
A major transition in old age occurs due to the loss of spouse that contributes to a
feeling of increased insecurity among both men and women. According to the 2011 Census,
there were 29,77,672 widows in Karnataka, of which 67% of them live in rural areas and
remaining 33% or 9,91,530 widows live in urban areas. Similarly, the age wise distribution
shows that the highest number of widows is in the bracket of 60-64 years of age both in rural
and urban areas. But, otherwise, widowhood is more prominent across all age brackets in
rural areas than in urban centers (Fig 1.6.2). There is also significant increasing numbers of
oldest old (or) above 80 years population, counting to 2, 66,336 elderly widows, of which
70% of them live in rural Karnataka.
Figure.1.6.1: Age distribution of Figure 1.6.2: Age wise distribution of
Widows in Karnataka widows-Rural and urban comparison
Source: Karnataka Census-2011
19
Table1.6.1: Age distribution of Widows in Karnataka
Source: Karnataka Census-2011
Not having a spouse in the older ages is a cause for concern for both men and women. For
Indian women who have lost their spouse, financial security poses a problem, since women
generally do not own land or other assets and are dependent on their children, particularly
sons (Lekha, 2011). These elderly women will have special needs for health and support.
While the Government of India has enacted several policies and programmes for destitute
women in India such as Indira Gandhi National Widow Pension Scheme (IGNWPS) 40
under the National Social Assistance Programme (NSAP), Antyodaya Anna Yojana,
Annapurna scheme, Swadhar scheme, and various schemes sponsored by the respective
States, there have been gaps in implementation of the schemes. Though there is a substantial
amount of growth in the number of beneficiaries enrolled in various schemes, a large number
of widows, primarily in the rural areas, are either not aware about their entitlement to a
pension or do not know how to access it. Also, for the uneducated widows in the rural areas
there is difficulty in obtaining relevant documents such as birth and death certificates and
paper work that are required to access their entitlements. Acquiring death certificates within
the stipulated period of 30 days after the death of the husband is difficult given the socio-
Age-group Total-Females Urban Rural
20-24 22486 7614 14872
25-29 53738 18076 35662
30-34 87813 30566 57247
35-39 149452 54327 95125
40-44 191670 70215 121455
45-49 254571 95871 158700
50-54 288563 106887 181676
55-59 280821 106595 174226
60-64 434387 142078 292309
65-69 395104 118838 276266
70-74 361940 101685 260255
75-79 190791 59893 130898
80+ 266336 78885 187451
20
economic condition of widows and stigma and discrimination faced following the loss of
their spouses. Travelling to district office to get the relevant forms for pension, opening bank
accounts to access the pension is equally difficult and complex for widows, especially for the
older ones. These challenges are compounded with limitations of financial literacy.
1.7 Disabled people in Karnataka
The Constitution of India ensures equality, freedom, justice and dignity of all individuals
and implicitly mandates an inclusive society for all including the persons with disabilities.
The Constitution in the schedule of subjects lays direct responsibility of the empowerment of
the persons with disabilities on the State Governments Therefore; the primary responsibility
to empower the persons with disabilities rests with the State Governments. The various types
of disability that are considered are: disabled in –seeing, speech, hearing, movement and
mental.
The official estimates of disabled persons in India, obtained through the latest Population
Census and National Sample Survey Organization’s comprehensive surveys on disability,
put the figure as about 26.8 million. In percentage terms, this stands at 2.21 %. In Karnataka
there were 1.32 million differently-abled people, as per census 2011. This accounts to
approximately 5 % of the total differently-abled population in India. Highest number of
disabled population of about 4, 81,294 persons with disability were found in the age bracket
10-19 and 20-29. Among all the age groups, the proportion of men with disabilities was
higher as compared to women. Again out of total disabled population, nearly 7.5 per cent
suffered from more than one type of the disabilities. In this category the in the advanced age,
the proportion of women with disability was higher as compared to men. The types of
disability covered were (i) mental disability in the form of (a) mental retardation or (b)
mental illness, (ii) visual disability in the form of (a) blindness or (b) low vision, (iii) hearing
disability, (iv) speech disability, and (v) locomotor disability. In the case of locomotor
disability, more than one type of locomotor disability was considered as multiple disabilities.
21
Table 1.7.1 Disabled people in Karnataka
Karnataka Disability Data-Census 2011
Total number Disabled Persons in Karnataka Person with multiple disabilities
Age group Total Male Female Total Male Female
0-4 58602 30721 27881 4508 2523 1985
5-9 93449 51342 42107 11435 6709 4726
10-19 237332 130720 106612 24226 13759 10467
20-29 243962 133564 110398 16238 9035 7203
30-39 193941 108554 85387 10840 5979 4861
40-49 157235 91900 65335 8398 5053 3345
50-59 118482 67791 50691 6012 3612 2400
60-69 113719 60679 53040 7033 3816 3217
70-79 69151 34765 34386 6084 2966 3118
80-89 28285 12345 15940 3633 1507 2126
90+ 8513 3298 5215 1521 529 992
Total 1324205 726521 597684 100013 55532 44481
Source: Karnataka Census-2011
1.7.1 Working Status of Disabled people
Literacy and economic support are the two far-most important basic needs of the disabled to
rehabilitate them. Providing education and creating opportunities for participation in
economically productive activities changes the disabled people’s life styles in many ways
and brings self-confidence in them.
Census classifies workers as Main workers and marginal workers. Main Workers are
those workers who had worked for the major part of the reference period i.e. 6 months or
more. Marginal Workers are those workers who had not worked for the major part of the
reference period i.e. less than 6 months. The Main workers are classified on the basis of
Industrial category of workers into four categories as Cultivators, Agricultural Laborers,
Household Industry Workers and Other Workers. Non-workers are students, household
workers, pensioner, beggars, rentiers, and those who are dependent on others for their
survival. Most of the disabled workers from both rural and urban areas are in the age group
of 15-59 years. Nearly 51% of disabled male workers and nearly 22 % of the disabled female
workers are in the “main worker” category.
22
Age wise and gender wise distribution of disabled workers
Figure 1.7.1 : Total Disabled worker
Source: Karnataka Census-2011
Figure 1.7.2 : Disabled Main worker
Source: Karnataka Census-2011
Figure 1.7.3 : Disabled Marginal worker
Source: Karnataka Census-2011
The Government of India, through Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment and
the Government of Karnataka through the Department of Social Welfare & disabled are
entrusted with responsibility of providing welfare measures to handicapped children. The
Department of welfare provides various types of the benefits in the form of education,
0-14 15-59 60+ 0-14 15-59 60+
Rural Urban
Male 88727 271934 77575 57797 196134 33512
Female 71548 204908 77311 50564 161391 31270
050000
100000150000200000250000300000
0-14 15-59 60+ 0-14 15-59 60+
Rural Urban
Male 1862 143238 26245 1517 118013 9926
Female 1287 58097 9098 1082 36721 2769
020000400006000080000
100000120000140000160000
0-14 15-59 60+ 0-14 15-59 60+
Rural Urban
Male 1070 25501 4646 1262 14607 1639
Female 1016 26884 4830 1164 9729 1169
05000
1000015000200002500030000
Disabled-Marginal worker
23
employment and training, rehabilitation and social security measures to improve the
capabilities of the disabled. However, the census statistics show nearly half of the disabled
were of age less than 30 and only one-fourth of disabled persons were of age 50 or more.
This is of serious concern as most of the disabled persons were found to be very young. The
Governments, both at center and state, have to take necessary steps for the upliftment of this
section of the society.
1.8 Destitute Women in Karnataka
Desertion is the failure of marital life, and therefore, it has serious repercussions on
the individual, family and the community. The most basic and also the foremost problem that
these women face is the problem of social insecurity and loneliness. Deserted women come
across other problems too, of accommodation, raising children, etc. Studies of widows and
divorced or separated women show that the financial problems of single mothers are severe.
Many live at a bare subsistence level and face continuing difficulties in providing food,
clothing and shelter for themselves and their children. Problems of desertion are entirely
different from that of divorce. A divorcee is legally free to remarry whereas desertees are
not.
The aim of this section is to use census 2011 data to understand the distribution of
destitute women in the age group between 40 years to 60 years of age, and using the review
of literature, highlight the problems that the women desertees encounter after desertion. As
per census 2011, the incidence of the desertion was higher in the age group of 50-54 years,
and it is more prominent in rural areas than in urban areas. Among the various types of
classification, incidence of widowhood is much higher across all the age brackets in the rural
and as well as in urban areas. There were 10.15 lakh widows, 93,570 unmarried women and
73,182 women separated from their spouse, and 9,654 divorced. Thus, it can be inferred
from the above statistics that divorce is not a common practice though a large number of
married women were deserted by their husbands.
24
Figure 1.8.1: Age wise Distribution of destitute women in Karnataka
Source: Karnataka Census-2011
Table 1.8.1: Age wise Distribution of destitute women in Karnataka
Urban/Rural Age-group Never Married Widowed Separated Divorced Total
Rural 40-44 17527 121455 19733 2129 160844
45-49 12654 158700 15964 1647 188965
50-54 9592 181676 11094 1155 203517
55-59 6436 174226 6502 716 187880
Urban 40-44 16592 70215 7125 1485 95417
45-49 12651 95871 6128 1218 115868
50-54 10072 106887 4030 751 121740
55-59 8046 106595 2606 553 117800
Source: Karnataka Census-2011
1.9 Aaadhar Card Enrolment in Karnataka
Aadhaar number is a unique 12- digit number provided by the Unique Identification
Authority of India (UIDAI) on behalf of the Government of India. This number will serve as
a proof of identity and address anywhere in India for an individual, irrespective of age and g
ender, who is a resident in India and satisfies the verification process laid down by the
UIDAI. A problem in reaching benefits to poor and marginalized residents is that they often
lack the identification documents they need to receive benefits of government sponsored
schemes (SharmaV. 2011). Thus, by providing a clear proof of identity, the UID number
facilitates entry for poor and underprivileged residents into the formal banking system, and
the opportunity to avail services provided by the government and the private sector.
0
100000
200000
40
-44
45
-49
50
-54
55
-59
40
-44
45
-49
50
-54
55
-59
Rural Urban
Marital status
Never Married
Widowed
Separated
Divorced
25
0
5000000
10000000
15000000
20000000
25000000
Bengaluru
Division
Gulbarga
division
Belgaum
Division
Mysore
Division
Series1 20023198 1,00,10,474 1,40,36,953 11944194
No
. o
f A
ad
ha
ars
Table1.9.1: Aadhaar Enrolments in Karnataka till June 2016
Source: Government of Karnataka.
Figure 1.9.1: Number of Aadhaars in Karnataka till June 2016
Source: Government of Karnataka.
Of the 4 revenue divisions in the state, the division with the least Aadhaar enrolment is
Gulbarga division, followed Belguam division. Bengaluru division has seen the highest
enrolment with over 2 crore people enrolled for Aadhaar cards. Of all the 30 districts in
Karnataka, the highest enrolment is in Bengaluru with over 80 lakh people enrolled in
Mysore Division
District Name No. of Aadhaar
Chamrajanagara 939187
Chikkamangaluru 1064603
Mangalore 1938299
Hassan 1658678
Kodagu 493209
Udupi 1168026
Mandya 1658482
Mysuru 3023710
Bengaluru Division
District Name No. of Aadhaar
Bengaluru 8037478
Bengaluru Rural 888275
Chikkaballapur 1106684
Davangere 1797636
Kolar 1368990
Ramanagar 968168
Shimoga 1588909
Tumakur 2736710
Chitradurga 1530348
Belgaum Division
District Name No. of Aadhaar
Bagalkot 1753572
Belgaum 4582523
Bijapur 2055942
Dharwad 1822049
Gadag 969885
Haveri 1508185
Karwar 1344797
Gulbarga division
District Name No. of Aadhaar
Ballari 2242481
Bidar 1529857
Gulbarga 2289774
Koppal 1235246
Yadgir 1044413
Raichur 1668703
26
Aadhaar scheme, while Kodagu has seen the lowest with only close to 5 lakh people having
enrolled in the scheme. Given the increasing acceptance of Aadhaar, linking Aadhaar number
with the pension accounts has its own benefits. The Aaadhar seeding can help in identifying
fake beneficiaries and detect fraudulent practices by false claimants. Clear accountability and
transparent monitoring would significantly improve access and quality of entitlements to
beneficiaries and the agency alike. In order to make the pension disbursal system corruption-
free and transparent, government shall link social security scheme beneficiaries’ bank
accounts with their Aadhaar card and make their names public.
27
2 Social Security Measures in Karnataka: Overview to Schemes India’s national and State social pension schemes aim to alleviate chronic poverty
through regular cash transfers to destitute elderly, widows and disabled people who have no
regular means of subsistence from their own sources of income or through financial support
from family members or other sources. Until the recent introduction of the National Rural
Employment Guarantee Act, social pensions were the most significant cash-only social
protection transfer In India and remain a critical source of support for vulnerable groups
(Dutta, 2008).
The Directorate of Social Security and Pensions (SSP), Revenue Department, Govt. of
Karnataka, has been implementing six schemes for the poor people in old age, widows,
destitute women, disabled and transgenders. These are two old age pension schemes, namely
Indira Gandhi National Old Age Pension Scheme (IGNOAPS), a centrally sponsored scheme
and Sandhya Suraksha Yojana (SSY), a fully state funded scheme, aimed to help eligible
elderly citizens by providing them with direct cash pensions. The other four schemes are
Destitute Widow Pension Scheme for the empowering widows, Physically Handicapped
Pension Scheme to provide financial assistance to Disabled people, Manaswini scheme for
the destitute, divorced and unmarried women aged above 40 years, and Mythri scheme for
transgenders.
The pension schemes mentioned above are part of the larger structures being built to
provide safety net mechanisms to the disadvantaged section of the society. Considerable
budgetary allocation is involved in running these schemes. Sandhya Suraksha Yojana, a fully
State sponsored scheme, with the highest number of beneficiaries among the six schemes has
incurred an expenditure of Rs.1167 crores to State’s exchequer, in percentage terms it is
0.14% of the GSDP for the year 2015-16. Destitute Widow Pension scheme incurred an
expenditure of about Rs. 925.57 crore and Disability Pension Scheme with about 8.28 lakh
beneficiaries has incurred Rs. 804 crore in the same financial year. In sum, Government of
Karnataka has spent Rs 3548.16 crore to provide financial assistance to the total of 53.84
lakh beneficiaries in these six schemes. This amount to 0.45% of the State GDP in the year
2015-16.
28
Table 2.0.1: Social expenditure Vs. Percentage of State GSDP
Name of the Scheme Total Beneficiaries % of Total Expenditure % age of GSDP
Old Age Pension 726658 13.5 601.7 0.077
Destitute Widow Pension 1543240 28.66 925.57 0.119
Physically Handicapped Pension 828429 15.39 804 0.103
Sandhya Suraksha Yojana 2206296 40.97 1167 0.149
Manaswini 73008 1.36 31.5 0.004
Mythri 1021 0.02 0.95 0.0001
Endosulphon Victim pension 5,852 0.11 17.44 0.002
total 5384504 100 3548.16 0.454
Karnataka GSDP (at 2011-12 constant price) Rs.7, 80,805.00 crore for FY 2015-16.
Source: Finance Department, Govt. of Karnataka, Beneficiary data from DSSP.
Due to the increased spending by the state government in the social assistance sector, in the
past 5 years, nearly 21.93 lakh new beneficiaries have been enrolled in these schemes. In
2015-16 alone, 8.35 lakh new beneficiaries have been enrolled in these flagship schemes. In
the last three years, nearly 5 lakh new beneficiaries have been added under these schemes
every year. As of year 2015-16, there were a total of 53.84 lakh beneficiaries receiving
pension under these six schemes.
Source: Beneficiary Data provided by DSSP, Author own calculation.
Table2.0.2 :Physical Progress in the six schemes
year Total Beneficiaries New Beneficiaries
2011-12 3190913 N.A.
2012-13 3485348 294435
2013-14 4042131 556783
2014-15 4549384 507253
2015-16 5384504 835120
Table2.0.3 : Growth in Beneficiaries of Old Schemes
Scheme Beneficiaries
Growth Growth % 2011-12 2015-16
OAP 571984 726658 154674 27
DWP 936125 1543240 607115 64.85
PHP 552891 828429 275538 49.83
SSY 1129913 2206296 1076383 95.26
Table 2.0.4 : Growth in Beneficiaries of New Schemes
New Schemes
Scheme Beneficiaries
Growth Growth % 2013-14 2015-16
Manaswini 11915 73008 61093 512.74
Mythri 215 1021 806 374.8
29
One of the state government’s flagship schemes with largest number of beneficiaries,
the Sandhya Suraksha Yojana scheme has seen around 95 % growth in the number of
beneficiaries in the last 5 years. From 11 lakh beneficiaries in 2011-12, the scheme’s
beneficiaries’ size has grown to nearly 22 lakh pensioners as on 2015-16. In the same
period, Destitute widow Pension Scheme beneficiaries’ size has grown by 64% from 9.36
lakh beneficiaries to 15.43 lakh pensioners. Similarly, under the Physically Handicapped
Pension Scheme, there were about 8.28 lakh disability pensioners, adding about 2.75 lakh
beneficiaries in the last 5 years. The Old Age Pension Scheme saw about 27% growth of
beneficiaries in past five years with a total of 7.26 lakh beneficiaries receiving pension under
this scheme, as on 2015-16. It is appreciable to note that the new scheme, Manaswini,
introduced in the year 2013, saw nearly 12,000 recipients enrolled in the same year, and
added another 61,000 beneficiaries during the next two years. There were nearly 73000
pensioners receiving financial assistance under this scheme of year 2015-16. However,
Mythri, a scheme designed for providing financial support to transgender saw only 215
beneficiaries enrolled in its commencement year, and had added only 806 beneficiaries since
the last two years.
The World Health Organization (WHO) classifies endosulphan moderately hazardous
pesticide while the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (US EPA) classifies it as a highly
hazardous pesticide. This hazardous material is readily absorbed by the stomach, by the
lungs, and through the skin, meaning that all routes of exposure can pose a hazard. People
exposed to Endosulphan may suffer from problems like congenital deformities, mental
retardation and physical deformities. The Karnataka Cashew Development Corporation
(KCDC) had resorted to aerial spraying of endosulfan right from 1980 to 2000 in various
districts of Karnataka- Dakshina Kannada, Udupi, and parts of Malnad area. It affected
almost 20 villages in the state. Though the aerial spraying was stopped in year 2000, many
children in more than 92 villages in four taluks of Dakshin Kannada district were born with
serious mental and physical problems. Many families have fallen into the debt trap to treat
patients. In 2015-16, 5852 such victims have received monthly pension under the
Endosulphan Victim pension scheme to meet their expenses. Though the pension could offer
financial assistance, preventive steps like ultrasound examination of pregnant women in the
affected areas for detection of fetal defects, health check-up of all marriageable age youth in
the affected areas are needed to reduce the future disease load, permanent care centres for the
affected people and comprehensive rehabilitation programme for the victims are needed.
30
2.1 Old Age Pension Scheme:
In India, most of those who have worked in organized sector get pension and other
retirement benefits after attaining the age of superannuation varying between 52 to 65 years.
But for others, which constitutes majority, are either self-employed or employed, lack of
such benefits means living with financial constraints (Kanchan, 2013). This may be the
reasons that among various support/schemes for elders, economic security remains the
foremost priority. OAP is one of the major welfare schemes for the aged. For those elderly
populations belonging to BPL family, the scheme brings in income security Pension serves
various objectives like poverty release, consumption smoothing and insurance in respect of
ageing population (Charan, 2013).
Directorate of SSP implements two old age pension schemes, Old Age Pension
Scheme and Sandhya Suraksha Yojana Scheme. The earliest schemes was the Old Age
Pension Scheme, which the Govt. of Karnataka has been implementing since 1964. The
scheme, however, was merged with Indra Gandhi National Old Age Pension Scheme
(IGNOAPS) on August 15, 1995 and implemented as a part of National Social Assistance
Programme. Under this IGNOAPS scheme, Government of India provides central assistance
with funds, and encourages States to add their own contribution. The merged scheme is
implemented as Old Age Pension Scheme in Karnataka. The scheme provides pensions only
to old age people above 60 years of age and belonging to Below Poverty Line (BPL)
households. The pension amount is Rs.200 pm for the elderly in the age band of 60 - 64
Years, and for those in the age band of 65 - 79 Years receive pension amount of Rs.500 pm
in which Government of India contributes its share of Rs.200 and Government of Karnataka
adds Rs.300. The oldest of the old, who are above 80 years receive pension amount of
Rs.750 pm in which central government’s contribution is Rs.500 and state contributes
Rs.250. The shares of centre and state contribution in the pension amount is given in the
below table.
Table2.1.1: Central and State Contribution in OAP Scheme
Age Bracket Pension Amount Central: State Contribution
60 - 64 Years Rs. 200 Rs. 200: 0
65 – 79 Years Rs. 500 Rs. 200: 300
Above 80 Years Rs. 750 Rs. 500: 250
Source: DSSP.
As of February 2016, OAP covers 7.2 Lakh beneficiaries across Karnataka, adding nearly
1.23 lakh new beneficiaries in the scheme. This is contrasting to performance in previous
31
38367
191
23011
93105
0
20000
40000
60000
80000
100000
BengaluruDivision
Gulbargadivision
BelgaumDivision
MysoreDivision
26%
16%
21%
37%
BengaluruDivision
Gulbargadivision
BelgaumDivision
MysoreDivision
years, where-in, only less than 10,000 beneficiaries have been added in the scheme, year-on-
year.
Table2.1.2: Annual growth in OAP beneficiaries
Year Total Beneficiaries New Beneficiaries
2011-12 571984 N.A.
2012-13 581558 9574
2013-14 591532 9974
2014-15 596812 5280
2015-16 720350 123538
Source: Beneficiary Data provided by DSSP, Author own calculation.
Among the five revenue divisions, Mysore division has seen the highest growth in the
enrollment of new beneficiaries. With total of 2.70 lakh beneficiaries, nearly 37% of the
pensioners are from Mysore division. The second in rank is Bengaluru division with 1.86
lakh beneficiaries as of 2015-16. In the last five years, nearly 93,000 new beneficiaries in
Mysore division, and 38,000 new beneficiaries from Bengaluru division have been enrolled
in the scheme. Surprisingly, only 191 new beneficiaries have been added in Gulbarga
division. The total number of pensioners in this division has not grown in the last five years
and has remained at nearly 1.4 lakh beneficiaries as of 2015-16.
Fig 2.1.1: percentage of OAP Fig 2.1.2: New Enrollments
In Beneficiaries in 2015-16 OAP in 5 years
Source: Beneficiary Data provided by DSSP
Among their peer group in their respective revenue divisions, districts with highest
number of pension beneficiaries were Belgaum, Ramanagar, Gulbarga, Chamrajanagar.
Districts with lowest number of pension beneficiaries: Shimoga, Yadgir, Haveri, Kodagu.
Among all the districts in the state, only Chamarajanagar is the only district wherein the
number of OAP beneficiaries is significantly larger than that of SSY. There were 92,404
32
beneficiaries under OAP scheme and 53,225 in SSY scheme from Chamarajanagar district,
according to pension beneficiary data provided by DSSP.
Table 2.1.3: Revenue division-wise distribution of OAP beneficiaries (from 2011-12 to
2015-16)
Source: Beneficiary Data provided by DSSP.
Bengaluru Division
District Name 2011-12 2012-13 2013-14 2014-15 2015-16
Bengaluru Urban 25,726 27463 27113 28,274 29,903
Bengaluru Rural 18,066 19647 23785 25781 26,358
Chikka Ballapur 9,861 12281 11701 11,807 11,990
Davangere 8,138 9716 11423 12,452 13,031
Kolar 27,600 27875 29030 32,407 34,539
Ramanagara 27,169 27116 27242 28,829 30,325
Shimoga 5,671 5987 6789 7,566 8,139
Tumakur 18,117 18621 17985 18,083 18,408
Chitradurga 7,564 7483 7349 7,213 13,586
Belgaum Division
District Name 2011-12 2012-13 2013-14 2014-15 2015-
16
Bagalkote 11,090 11843 12898 13,165 12,795
Belgaum 45,388 44780 44814 25,781 42,707
Bijapur 32,716 32679 30638 30,364 29,280
Dharwad 14,796 14858 15231 16,406 27,902
Gadag 17,472 24228 24548 26,750 29,726
Haveri 6,501 6658 6884 6,607 6,308
Karwar 4,513 4892 5244 5,777 6,769
Mysore Division
District Name 2011-12 2012-13 2013-14 2014-15 2015-16
Chamraja nagar 37,944 37765 42548 49,723 92,404
Chikka mangaluru 5,159 5108 5322 5,918 6,426
Mangalore 5,545 5226 4893 4,525 4,433
Hassan 52,858 53258 52442 53,600 55,047
Kodagu 2,600 2513 2371 2,397 2,669
Udupi 1,870 2206 3346 3,722 3,963
Mandya 38,955 36505 37351 39,272 77,168
Mysuru 32,503 29517 28747 28,458 28,429
Gulbarga Division
District Name 2011-12 2012-13 2013-14 2014-15 2015-16
Ballari 26,576 25610 25860 26,009 28,368
Bidar 13,826 14743 14027 13,280 13,201
Gulbarga 38,332 37668 36309 35,784 36,186
Koppal 12,579 11901 11133 10,755 10,381
Yadgir 7,077 7199 6515 6,491 6,215
Raichur 15,772 16212 17994 19,616 20,002
33
India does not have a population-wide mechanism of providing social security,
because of which, people work as long as possible to support themselves. Therefore, a large
population of the elderly continues to participate in the work force with nearly 95 percent of
them self-employed. The impact of rising inflation lowers the income that may be allocated
to health (Charan, 2013). There are large numbers of elderly population who are performing
actively or engaged in certain job to sustain themselves and their family, and remain
resourceful to family. Earlier census reports on India reveal that nearly forty percent of the
old population face financial constraints and are living in poor status; of these, around ninety
percent belong to households engaged in the unorganized sector with no sustainable
economic security (kanchan, 2013). Private saving is often difficult or entirely infeasible for
many Indians for several reasons: earnings are low, a significant portion of the economic
activity is informal and may not be tied to cash exchange, and, given that seventy percent of
the aging population in India lives in a rural area, bank accounts are often not available.
Hence, to continue to remain engaged in labour force is the only option available to many of
the elderly. The employment of elderly also implies that in many cases they do not have any
kind of financial support from the next to kin and have to manage their own financial needs.
An earlier survey based study on 1136 OAP beneficiaries in Gulbarga, Mandya and Kodagu
districts of Karnataka shows that 94.67 percent of beneficiaries have utilized some amount
from their pension for food, 84 percent for cloth, 89.94 percent for medicine and 30.78
percent utilized some portion of the amount for relatives from the pension amount. Thus, in
this regard, the present practice of old age pension by the government mainly focused on
BPL population can be viewed as a helping hand for the aged. This pension benefits infuse
confidence and self-esteem in elderly along with imparting in them a sense of social security
as well as of economic relevance.
A Simplistic comparison between the size of the elderly people in Karnataka which
was around 57.91 lakh according to census 2011. And the total number beneficiaries
accounting to 29.32 lakh pensioners in 2015-16 under the OAP & SSY scheme put together
shows that nearly 50 % of the total elderly population in Karnataka are benefiting under
these two schemes. Thus, it can be inferred that these two schemes are well targeted and, the
schemes are in active demand among the old age population in Karnataka.
34
2.2 Sandhya Suraksha Yojana:
Sandhya Suraksha Yojane is another old age pension programme implemented
by the State Government since 2007. The scheme is fully sponsored by the State. The
purpose of the scheme is to provide financial assistance through cash transfers of pension
amount Rs 500 pm to the elderly people aged above 65 years. With similar features to OAP,
SSY intends to cover the larger section of poor elderly who may not be covered through
OAP. While the benefit amount and age criterion have been the same as in the case of OAP,
the difference lies in income eligibility. Benefits under SSY can be availed by elderly
persons earning up to Rs. 20,000 per annum and those who were not availing any other
benefits like family pension, widow pension, physically handicapped pension and old age
pension. The intended beneficiaries are from occupational groups such as Small farmers,
Marginal farmers, Agricultural laborers, Weavers, fishermen, laborers from unorganized
sectors (excluding Building and other construction workers). As on February 2016, there
were 22 lakh beneficiaries across the state availing pension under the scheme. Table shows
the annual growth in number of beneficiaries of SSY in Karnataka. It can be seen from this
table that, within the short time frame of 4 years, the size of the beneficiaries has doubled
from 11 lakh in 2011-12 to 22 lakh beneficiaries in 2015-16.
Table 2.2.1: Annual growth in SSY
Beneficiaries
Year Total
Beneficiaries
New
Beneficiaries
2011-12 1129913 N.A.
2012-13 1257753 127840
2013-14 1558201 300448
2014-15 1781827 223626
2015-16 2206296 424469
Table2.2.2: Revenue division-wise new
enrollments
Revenue
Divisions
Total
Beneficiaries
New
Enrollments
Bengaluru 7,58,696 376561
Gulbarga 3,81,970 177442
Belgaum 5,25,597 225064
Mysore 5,40,033 297316
Source: Beneficiary Data provided by DSSP.
Among the four revenue divisions, Bengaluru division saw the highest number of
enrollments in last 5 years with 3.76 lakh beneficiaries being added in to the scheme with
total of 7.58 lakh beneficiaries receiving pension. This forms nearly 34% of total
beneficiaries under the scheme. This is followed by Mysore division with 5.4 lakh
beneficiaries as on 2015-16, which forms 25 % or one-fourth of total beneficiaries in the
State, and nearly 2.97 lakh new beneficiaries have been enrolled in last 5 years. The third in
the list is Belgaum with 5.25 lakh beneficiaries and, fourth is Gulbarga with 3.81 lakh
beneficiaries adding 1.7 lakh beneficiaries in last 5 years.
35
376561
177442225064
297316
Bengaluru
Division
Gulbarga
division
Belgaum
Division
Mysore
Division
34%
17%24%
25%
Bengaluru
Division
Gulbarga
division
Belgaum
Division
Mysore
Division
Fig 2.2.1: Percentage of SSY Fig 2.2.2: New Enrollments in SSY
Beneficiaries in 2015-16 Scheme in 5years
Source: Beneficiary data provided by DSSP.
In a short span of five years since the commencement, SSY scheme has become one of
the most popular pension schemes in Karnataka. New beneficiaries have been enrolled in the
scheme from all the districts, year-on-year. This shows that the scheme is in demand among
the potential beneficiaries, and the pension amount is creating economic value to them. An
inter-district comparison shows that, while in some districts such as Chitradurga, Mandya
and Belguam, there has been substantial growth in the number of new beneficiaries, in few
other districts such as Gadag, Karwar, and Haveri, only about 4000 new beneficiaries have
been enrolled. Tumakur in Bengaluru division has the highest number of beneficiaries with
1.42 lakh pensioners as of 2015-16, while Kodugu, with only 17,711 beneficiaries has the
lowest. Urban Bengaluru, Tumakur, Chitradurga, Belagum Mandya and Mysore districts
have more than 1 lakh beneficiaries, each.
Table 2.2.3: Revenue division-wise distribution of SSY beneficiaries (from 2011-12 to 2015-
16)
Bengaluru Division
District Name 2011-12 2012-13 2013-14 2014-15 2015-16
Bengaluru Urban 60,987 70658 81650 1,05,355 1,19,957
Bengaluru Rural 31,741 32182 36468 39,753 43,316
Chikkaballapur 26,332 36065 46649 57,493 67,659
Davangere 49,337 54071 61104 68,305 73,601
Kolar 45,028 48101 61008 71,687 79,012
Ramanagar 36,371 38748 50184 72,040 81,142
Shimoga 29,312 29688 33289 40,030 45,285
Tumakur 68,107 75031 96379 1,20,345 1,42,207
Chitradurga 34,920 38895 58341 75,821 1,06,517
36
Source: Beneficiary Data provided by DSSP.
A study by Kanchan and Charan (2013) notes that large populations of the elderly
continue to participate in the work force as self-employed even in their old age. This
situation implies that in many cases they do not have any kind of financial support from the
next to kin and have to manage their own financial needs. Thus, by relaxing the eligibility
criteria of minimum income levels with the intention to cover the larger section of poor
elderly who may not be covered through OAP, SSY scheme has been in well-targeted
direction. While OAP focuses on the poor elderly under the BPL category, SSY scheme
extends the coverage to include elderly people in the marginally BPL category. Kanchan
and Charan (2013) also recommend that, the governments should consider for providing
universal old age pension in order to include all elderly people under social security network.
This would infuse confidence and self-esteem in elderly along with imparting in them a
sense of social security as well as economic relevance. The Fiscal cost of the SSY and OAP
Gulbarga Division
District Name 2011-12 2012-13 2013-14 2014-15 2015-16
Ballari 40,784 43455 48598 54,230 62,485
Bidar 47,262 52223 56783 65,522 76,032
Gulbarga 36,356 37116 45427 58,521 68,946
Koppal 34,999 38413 47867 57,287 62,987
Yadgir 25,213 28046 35461 45,550 52,240
Raichur 19,914 23620 35634 47,011 59,280
Belgaum Division
District Name 2011 -12 2012-13 2013-14 2014-15 2015-16
Bagalkote 46,203 48259 56418 63195 66876
Belgaum 85,251 94759 114571 39753 163641
Bijapur 41,447 46325 63362 82133 92055
Dharwad 38,620 41534 44522 47228 69469
Gadag 24,702 28294 32379 35853 39261
Haveri 41,848 43715 50795 54094 57490
Karwar 22,462 24016 27844 32508 36805
Mysore Division
District Name 2011-12 2012-13 2013-14 2014-15 2015-16
Chamrajanagar 21,668 25337 33846 39892 53225
Chikka mangaluru 21,682 26146 33170 39984 49155
Mangalore 20,846 24296 28706 36178 42288
Hassan 27,736 37997 59801 71,926 80,671
Kodagu 7,580 12832 15558 16,047 17711
Udupi 34,094 36096 41986 48,273 52653
Mandya 55,440 60690 76730 91203 125875
Mysuru 53,671 61145 83671 104610 118455
37
30%
17%25%
28%
BengaluruDivision
Gulbargadivision
BelgaumDivision
197003
104252
169441 171772
0
50000
100000
150000
200000
250000
BengaluruDivision
Gulbargadivision
BelgaumDivision
MysoreDivision
scheme for the year 2015-16 was 0.22% of state GDP. With the Karnataka GSDP growing at
6.5% year-on-year on an average in the last five years, the state government may consider
expanding this scheme to provide universal pension scheme for the elderly people. If
universal pension is not immediately feasible, considering universal coverage of old age
health insurance would be a welcome effort as the health related expenditure rises
significantly with age for the elders.
2.3 Destitute Widow Pension Scheme
While the Government of India has enacted several policies and programmes for
destitute women in India, there is one specific national pension programme for widows. In
2009, the Indira Gandhi National Widow Pension Scheme (IGNWPS) was introduced by
Government of India under the National Social Assistance Programme (NSAP). At the time
of this research, the programme was meant to benefit widows between 40 to 59 years living
below the poverty line (BPL), excluding widows who do not fall in this age group. Though
IGNWPS is a recent scheme, Destitute Widow Pensions scheme (DWP), a Government of
Karnataka initiative, has been in operation since 1984 to assist destitute widows in the age
group above 18 years. The eligibility criteria are that she should belong to BPL household,
husband is legally dead and her income should not exceed Rs. 12000 PA in rural areas and
Rs. 17000 PA in urban areas. The pension is paid until she remarries or her children starts
supporting her or her annual income limit cross the limit as mentioned above or till her
death. Currently, Rs.500 is provided as pension per month. After the age of 60, the widows
become eligible for the old age pension. There were 15.43 lakh widow pensioners in the state
in as on 2015-16. In the last one year alone, nearly 2.51 lakh new beneficiaries have been
enrolled in the scheme. The table 2.3.Shows the number of new beneficiaries being added in
to the scheme year-on-year basis. Since last 5 years, more than 1 lakh new beneficiaries have
been added in the scheme every year. This shows the Popularity and demand for the scheme.
Fig 2.3.1: Percentage of DWP Fig 2.3.2: New Enrollments
Beneficiaries in 2015-16 in DWPS in 5 years
Source: Beneficiary Data provided by DSSP.
38
Table 2.3.1: Annual growth in DWP Table 2.3.2: Revenue division-wise
Beneficiaries’ new enrollments in DWP
Year Total
beneficiaries
New
Beneficiaries
2011-12 900772 * N.A
2012-13 1040633 139861
2013-14 1207320 166687
2014-15 1292034 84714
2015-16 1543240 251206 Source: Beneficiary Data provided by DSSP
Among the four revenue divisions, Bengaluru division has seen the highest number of
beneficiaries- with 1.97 lakh beneficiaries receiving widow pension, closely followed by
Mysore division with 1.71 lakh beneficiaries, as on 2015-16. In percentage terms, they
contribute 30% of the beneficiaries from Bengaluru division followed by 28% of the
beneficiaries from Mysore division. Bengaluru-Urban, Bellary, Belgaum, Mandya districts
have seen the highest number of beneficiaries among their peer districts.
Table 2.3.3: Revenue division-wise distribution of DWPS Beneficiaries
(From 2011-12 to 2015-16)
Bengaluru Division
District Name 2011-12 2012-13 2013-14 2014-15 2015-16
Bengaluru Urban 45,238 54553 67024 85,965 98,708
Bengaluru Rural 19,104 19602 23255 85,965 27,146
Chikkaballapur 21,105 25796 29556 32,524 34,581
Davangere 29,636 37577 43854 49,295 53,182
Kolar 30,757 33224 37911 41,502 43,435
Ramanagara 33,121 34146 40333 44,572 47,759
Shimoga 22,217 24518 27899 32,062 35,057
Tumakur 37,484 43540 52846 61,894 67,406
Chitradurga 23,636 25992 33040 36,807 52,027
Revenue
Division
New
Enrollments
in last 5 years
Total number
of Beneficiaries
Bengaluru 197003 4,59,301
Gulbarga 104252 2,56,462
Belgaum 169441 3,87,708
Mysore 171772 4,39,769
Mysore Division
District Name 2011-12 2012-13 2013-14 2014-15 2015-16
Chamraja Nagar 30,624 33383 37278 39,533 57,086
Chikka mangaluru 15,782 19454 22962 25,958 28,595
Mangalore 24,749 26722 30116 34,259 37,718
Hassan 47,085 51446 57929 61,953 64,723
Kodagu 8,431 10164 11574 11,479 12,368
Udupi 21,999 24602 26131 28,672 30,787
Mandya 66,755 71758 79621 84,927 1,21,648
Mysuru 52,572 57226 68568 80,473 86,844
39
Source: Beneficiary Data provided by DSSP.
Apart from this flagship Destitute Widow Pension scheme, Government of
Karnataka has taken various initiatives for the economic wellbeing of the destitute
widows. Udyogini is one such innovative scheme started in the year 1997-98. This
Udyogini scheme empowers women by providing loans through Banks and other
financial institutions. The benefits of the scheme are available to all women, however,
widows and destitute women are given special provisions such as relaxing the income
limit, and loans are provided at subsidized rate. There are also various training
programmes conducted to impart skills for self-employment and wage employment.
These programmes are conducted through Government & Quasi Government
Technical Institutions and NGOs with good track records.
Belgaum Division
District Name 2011-12 2012-13 2013-14 2014-15 2015-16
Bagalkote 35,353 39895 45983 50,991 54139
Belgaum 62,630 68111 80186 25764 101671
Bijapur 35,155 38446 45075 50959 54511
Dharwad 35,488 38487 40997 43212 58706
Gadag 24,878 28594 31680 34355 35824
Haveri 39,338 41977 47511 50376 52823
Karwar 20,778 23297 25748 28251 30034
Gulbarga Division
District Name 2011-12 2012-13 2013-14 2014-15 2015-16
Ballari 42,130 45696 52710 58,842 67,438
Bidar 21,649 25460 30008 34,606 38,322
Gulbarga 26,810 28096 32966 38,742 43,524
Koppal 22,747 26024 30676 34,235 36,120
Yadgir 14,196 14983 17323 21,124 23,106
Raichur 24,678 27864 36560 42,938 47,952
40
2.4 Physically Handicapped Pension Scheme
Physically Handicapped Pension (PHP) scheme has been implemented in the state since
the year 1977 to provide a monthly pension to blind, mentally retarded, hearing impairment,
locomotor disability handicaps, disability accrued due to leprosy and mentally ill. Handicap
persons already inmates of the Govt./Aided/ private institutions are not eligible. Under this
Social Security Scheme, persons with disability whose economic condition is so poor as to
not be able to meet his/her basic needs and unable to maintain himself/herself with food
clothing and shelter are covered under this scheme. A monthly pension amount of Rs.500 pm
is provided for a person having disability above 40% & below 75%, and Rs. 1200 pm for
persons having disability above 75%. The income criterion for eligibility is that his/her
annual income should not exceed Rs 12,000/- PA in rural areas and Rs. 17000 PA in urban
areas. Identity cards are issued to eligible persons to enable them to avail the entitled benefits
under various governmental schemes. Tahasildar of the taluk is the sanctioning authority.
Any child born with disability mentioned in the scheme, or disability accrued due to accident
with disability above 40% is eligible for pension. The total number of persons receiving
disability pensions in the state was 8.28 lakh as on year 2015-16. A comparison between
Table PHP – Total & PHP- below 75 % shows that there were more number of beneficiaries
with below 75% disability than the beneficiaries with above 75% disability. There were 4.84
lakh beneficiaries with disability below 75% and 3.43 lakh beneficiaries with disability
above 75% receiving pension under this scheme.
Table 2.4.1: Annual growth in PHP beneficiaries
PHP-Total
Year Total
Beneficiaries
New
Beneficiaries
2011-12 552891 N.A.
2012-13 896447 343556
2013-14 1423776 527329
2014-15 706983 -716793
2015-16 828429 121446
PHP-below 75%
Year Beneficiaries-
Total
New
Beneficiaries
2011-12 388400 N.A.
2012-13 404342 15942
2013-14 416207 11865
2014-15 406173 -10034
2015-16 484873 78700
41
34%
20%
24%
22%
BangaloreDivision
Gulbargadivision
BelgaumDivision
MysoreDivision
Fig 2.4.1: Percentage of beneficiaries Fig 2.4.2: New Enrollments
in PHP in 2015-16 in PHP in last 5 years
Source: Beneficiary Data provided by DSSP.
Among the four revenue divisions, Bengaluru division has seen the highest number
of beneficiaries being enrolled in the scheme in the last 5 years with 2.43 lakh beneficiaries,
closely followed by Belgaum division with 2.42 lakh beneficiaries, as on year 2015-16. In
percentage terms, they contribute to 36% of the beneficiaries from Bengaluru division,
followed by 24% of the beneficiaries from Belguam division. Tumakur, Chitradurga,
Bellary, Belgaum, Mandya districts have seen the highest enrollment of beneficiaries in the
last 5 years.
Table2.4.2: Revenue division-wise distribution of PHP Beneficiaries (from 2011-12 to 2015-
16)
243634
155314
242422
153129
0
50000
100000
150000
200000
250000
300000
BangaloreDivision
Gulbargadivision
BelgaumDivision
MysoreDivision
Bangalore Division
District Name 2011-12 2012-13 2013-14 2014-15 2015-16
Bengaluru Urban 17648 42982 60630 36267 40817
Bengaluru Rural 8308 8679 9389 10,350 11012
Chikkaballapur 11144 21399 32543 19026 20807
Davangere 18170 31041 49211 25801 27128
Kolar 15329 28270 43599 20346 21002
Ramanagara 14609 22680 37289 18353 19265
Shimoga 14930 23749 38679 18122 19039
Tumakur 29606 47467 77073 40123 42148
Chitradurga 20501 35119 55620 27543 42416
42
Source: Beneficiary Data provided by DSSP.
The state government has implemented multiple schemes and created provisions for
the benefit of persons with disabilities in the areas of education, rehabilitation, social
security, and employment. The PWD Act mandates that at least 3% of government jobs be
reserved for persons with disabilities. The state government has also provided applicants
with disabilities an age relaxation of 10 years over the maximum age limit prescribed for the
post. Disabled candidates writing exams conducted by the Karnataka Public Services
Commission are allowed a scribe (where the candidate is visually impaired) in addition to
provision of extra time to complete these exams. All employed disabled persons are also
exempt from payment of Professional Tax. Rehabilitation efforts in mainly consist of
providing shelter homes and special homes for the disabled apart from financially aiding
them in accessing aid and appliances designed for the disabled.
Mysore Division
District Name 2011-12 2012-13 2013-14 2014-15 2015-16
Chamrajanagar 13889 21617 35506 18149 27432
Chikkamangaluru 9343 16132 25475 12912 13908
Mangalore 13954 21535 35489 17666 17007
Hassan 21223 29576 50799 25441 26215
Kodagu 3781 6226 10007 4456 4691
Udupi 10418 15824 26242 12099 11689
Mandya 27327 38771 66098 32651 49538
Mysuru 26597 43862 70459 34479 36579
Belgaum Division
District Name 2011-12 2012-13 2013-14 2014-15 2015-16
Bagalkote 24293 37875 62168 31281 32606
Belgaum 48611 80664 129275 10350 67980
Bijapur 24306 33712 58018 31195 33373
Dharwad 20472 30930 51402 24230 34691
Gadag 19682 31508 51190 24443 25740
Haveri 25405 41168 66573 32082 33761
Karwar 12649 17572 30221 14563 14271
Gulbarga Division
District Name 2011-12 2012-13 2013-14 2014-15 2015-16
Ballari 23180 36939 60119 29422 33886
Bidar 15540 25860 41400 24642 27647
Gulbarga 21809 32721 54530 29099 32756
Koppal 17986 29281 47267 23434 24752
Yadgir 9310 16252 25562 13154 14475
Raichur 12871 22778 35649 19387 21798
43
The state government, acknowledging the needs of various aids and gadgets such as
tricycles, artificial limbs, crutches etc., introduced a scheme of assistance to help disabled
persons to purchase aids and appliances. By way of this scheme, persons with disabilities
who fulfill the necessary criteria are eligible for financial assistance to purchase aids and
gadgets. With regard to setting up of homes for disabled persons, the state government has
provided for the setup of a special home ‘Manasa Kendra’ to care for mentally ill persons in
five districts in Karnataka namely, Bangalore, Belgaum, Bellary, Raichur and Shimoga. In
the area of housing, state has issue orders directing the Karnataka Housing Board to provide
for a 3% reservation for persons with disabilities in all housing schemes initiated for the
poor, impoverished, slum dwellers and economically weaker sections of the society. The
state also facilitates for the issuance of an original Identity card as proof of their disability.
This ID card can be utilized for obtaining free bus pass, concessional rate of train fare,
concessional rate of airfare and other amenities.
2.5 Manaswini Scheme
The Karnataka state government started Manaswini scheme in August 2013 with the
purpose to provide social assistance to poor unmarried, separated and divorced women aged
above 40 years. Under this scheme, a monthly pension of Rs 500 pm is given to
beneficiaries. In the first year of implementation, nearly 12000 applicants were enrolled as
beneficiaries. In the last two years, nearly 30,000 beneficiaries were added to the scheme
year-on-year, with counting around total of 73000 beneficiaries added in to the scheme as on
year 2015-16. This shows that the scheme is welcomed greatly by the beneficiaries.
Table 2.5.1: Annual growth in Manaswini Table 2.5.2 : Revenue division-wise
new enrollments in beneficiaries Manaswini scheme
year Total
Beneficiaries
New
Beneficiaries
2013-14 11915 11915
2014-15 42408 30493
2015-16 73008 30600
Source: Beneficiary data provided by DSSP, Author own calculation
Of the four revenue divisions, Mysore division has the highest number of
beneficiaries with 36% of total beneficiaries (or) about 26,000 women benefit from this
scheme, followed by Bengaluru division with 30% of total beneficiaries (or) about 22,000
Revenue
Division
Total
Beneficiaries
New Enrollments
in 3 years
Bengaluru 22,193 18268
Gulbarga 5,503 5134
Belgaum 18,847 15169
Mysore 26,465 22,508
44
18268
5134
15169
22508
0
5000
10000
15000
20000
25000
BengaluruDivision
Gulbargadivision
BelgaumDivision
MysoreDivision
beneficiaries. Since the commencement of the scheme, nearly 18,000 beneficiaries from
Bengaluru division and about 22,000 beneficiaries from Mysore division have been added in
the scheme. Gulbarga division has the lowest number of beneficiaries among the peer
divisions.
Fig 2.5.1: percentage of Manaswini Fig 2.5.2: New Enrollments in
Beneficiaries in 2015-16 Manaswini in 5 years
Source: Beneficiary data provided by DSSP
Table 2.5.3: Revenue division-wise distribution of beneficiaries under Manaswini scheme (2013-
14 to 2015-16)
Bengaluru Division
District Name 2013-
14
2014-
15
2015-
16
Bengaluru Urban 43 768 1,455
Bengaluru Rural 97 660 948
Chikkaballapur 112 1124 1,719
Davangere 389 2,054 3,070
Kolar 2 313 716
Ramanagara 365 1,747 2,443
Shimoga 313 1421 1,968
Tumakur 1522 5,199 6,721
Chitradurga 1082 2478 3,153
Belgaum Division
District
Name
2013-
14
2014-
15
2015-
16
Bagalkote 349 1,335 1,805
Belgaum 1671 660 6,522
Bijapur 291 1,660 3,054
Dharwad 417 1,547 2,826
Gadag 399 1231 1,769
Haveri 220 919 1,365
Karwar 331 1056 1,506
Gulbarga division
District Name 2013
-14
2014-
15
2015
-16
Ballari 31 742 1,320
Bidar 27 266 526
Gulbarga 12 299 806
Koppal 247 1000 1,454
Yadgir 14 274 535
Raichur 38 365 862
Mysore Division
District Name 2013-14 2014-15 2015-
16
Chamrajanagar 0 0 5,235
Chikkamangalur
u 340 929 1,422
Mangalore 505 2,397 3,541
Hassan 312 1560 2,474
Kodagu 219 556 801
Udupi 471 1,761 2,542
Mandya 684 2,687 3,541
Mysore 1426 5,401 6,909
Source: Beneficiary data provided by DSSP
30%
8%26%
36%
BengaluruDivision
Gulbargadivision
BelgaumDivision
MysoreDivision
45
Tumakur, Belgaum and Mysore districts have highest number of beneficiaries each
with more than 6000 beneficiaries. Similarly, Bidar and Yadgir in Gulbarga division has the
lowest number of beneficiaries among all the districts of Karnataka. Both in Kolar and rural
Bengaluru, there has been a minimal enrollment since commencement of the scheme.
Desertion or separation from the husband accounts for one of the most serious types
of broken families. It leaves most married women economically disadvantaged and they
face the problem of social insecurity, loneliness, hardship in raising children, etc. A survey
based study on post-desertion problems of deserted women shows that, although a majority
of the respondents were working on daily or contract or salary basis, their financial condition
was vulnerable. A large portion of the earnings was spent on food, shelter and medicine.
While the educated women may find jobs and financial supports, illiterate deserted women
live at a bare subsistence level and face continuing difficulties in providing food, clothing
and shelter for themselves and their children (Renuka and Dr. Kazi (2013)). Another study
finds that women were considerably more likely than men to experience financial hardship
following divorce/ desertion (Pothen, 1986). A survey based study by Shanta and
Tamragundi (2013) finds that Women Training Programme and Nagar Stree Shakti
programmes are helpful in achieving socio-economic development of women in general and
the society as a whole. Thus, financial assistance through monthly pension and skill
development programmes to enhance employment opportunity for these destitute women
will be a welcome step towards their both economic prosperity and welfare.
2.6 Mythri Scheme:
The state government had started the Mythri program on August 2013 to help transgender
community and bring them to the mainstream of the society. Under this scheme, members of
sexual minorities aged above 25 years will be eligible for a monthly pension of Rs. 500. The
applicants will be required to submit relevant documents including a medical certificate from
the Department of Health and Family Welfare to prove their gender. Beneficiaries under this
scheme are not entitled to pension from any other social pension scheme. Due to the absence
of official census on transgenders, State government has no estimate on the number of
transgenders. Hence, they have to depend on KSAPS census for the estimate, thus
identifying the beneficiaries’ remains a hurdle. The latest census of the KSAPS estimates
that there are around 24,500 transgenders in the state. In the first year of the commencement
46
of the scheme, only 215 beneficiaries enrolled in the scheme, but the numbers have grown to
1021 beneficiaries as on year 2015-16. However, these enrollment numbers seems to be
meagre even when compared to KSAPS’ census figures on transgenders.
Table 2.6.1: Annual growth in beneficiaries in Mythri as on 2015-16
Year Total Beneficiaries New Beneficiaries
2013-14 215 215
2014-15 715 700
2015-16 1021 306
Source: Beneficiary Data provided by DSSP, Author own calculation
Fig 2.6.1: Revenue division-wise total beneficiaries in Mythri scheme
Source: Beneficiary Data provided by DSSP.
Table: 2.6.2: Revenue division-wise distribution of beneficiaries in Mythri Scheme
(From 2013-14 to 2015-16)
Bangalore Division
District Name 2013-14 2014-
15
2015-
16
Bengaluru
Urban
79 238 251
Bengaluru Rural 23 38 39
Chikkaballapur 6 55 62
Davangere 1 4 25
Kolar 1 5 9
amanagara 0 28 34
Shimoga 5 6 14
Tumakur 33 52 50
Chitradurga 13 18 19
Mysore Division
District Name 2013-
14
2014-
15
2015-
16
Chamrajanagar 0 0 7
Chikkamangaluru 1 2 3
Mangalore 0 4 6
Hassan 0 5 4
Kodagu 0 1 1
Udupi 0 3 26
Mandya 0 5 8
Mysuru 11 32 61
503
160242
116
0
100
200
300
400
500
600
BangaloreDivision
Kalaburagidivision
BelgaumDivision
MysoreDivision
47
Source: Beneficiary Data provided by DSSP
In a socially conservative country like India, transgender community faces a much
more daunting, tedious and uphill battle. The fight for access to education and health, legal
recognition, increased awareness, access to social welfare schemes and end to harassment
requires social mobilization of the transgender community. There is a urgent need for a
government-conducted transgender census to identify targeted beneficiaries. Also,
government should take necessary steps in guaranteeing rights and entitlements, reservations
in education, provide legal aid, and create employment opportunities for transgender.
Belgaum Division
District Name 2013-14 2014-15 2015-16
Bagalkote 1 44 65
Belgaum 20 38 64
Bijapur 7 13 60
Dharwad 0 18 31
Gadag 1 1 5
Haveri 1 5 17
Karwar 0 33 0
Gulbarga Division
District Name 2013-14 2014-15 2015-16
Ballari 1 40 50
Bidar 3 6 16
Gulbarga 7 16 27
Koppal 1 2 5
Yadgir 0 2 18
Raichur 0 1 44
48
3 Discussion The Government of India has recently announced a dramatic expansion of social
pension schemes both in terms of coverage and benefit levels. Participation in these social
pension schemes is an outcome of the following two factors –one, the demand for pensions
from potential recipients (in turn, contingent on awareness of the scheme, complexity of the
application procedure and perceived benefits) and two, the supply of pensions (linked to
possible rationing of pensions by area, depending on the availability of funds and/or on
administrative capacity). A survey based study reveals that pensions are the primary source
of financial support for three-fourths of the beneficiaries, while further 21% pensioners cite
these are their second main source of support. Half the current pensioners report spending
the pension benefits on their own needs while 39% report sharing these benefits with their
families. Only very few pensioners are in a position to save for future consumption (Puja
2008). On the administration front, several basic issues relating to implementation need to be
addressed, particularly with respect to transaction costs in the sanction of pensions, inter-
district variations in performance within the state, inadequate record-keeping and
monitoring. There is a strong case for moving towards a single system of automated
disbursements through money orders or directly into bank or post office accounts paid out
according to a uniform schedule (Puja 2008).
A significant number of elderly population continues to participate in the work
force as self-employed. The employment of elderly also implies that in many cases they do
not have any kind of financial support from the next to kin and have to manage their own
financial needs. In this regard, the present practice of providing old age pension by the
government targeting old age population in the BPL category can be viewed as a helping
hand for the aged. This would infuse confidence, self-esteem and a sense of social security in
them. As well, the pension amount has an economic relevance to the beneficiaries. With the
Karnataka GSDP growing at 6.5% year-on-year on an average in the last five years, the state
government shall consider to create additional fiscal space for expanding the present scheme
to a universal pension scheme for all the elderly people in Karnataka. If universal pension is
not immediately feasible, considering universal coverage of old age health insurance would
be a welcome effort as the health related expenditure rises significantly with age for the
elders.
49
With total 22 lakh beneficiaries, the recently introduced SSY scheme with the
intention to cover the larger section of poor elderly who may not be covered through OAP,
the scheme has been in well-targeted direction. While OAP focus on the poor elderly under
the BPL category, SSY scheme extends the coverage to include elderly people in the
marginally BPL category.
A survey based study on delivery of three pension schemes - OAP, DWP, PHP by
Rajeshekar,et.al (2009) finds that among the pensioners engaged in economic activities, most
of them were engaged in the unorganized sector, undertaking wage employment in
agriculture or self-employment in the non-agricultural sector. As such, it appears that most of
the pensioners are in a disadvantageous position in terms of demographic, physical and
economic status. The targeting of the social security and pension benefits appears to be in the
right direction, indicated by the large-scale coverage of weaker sections including women.
Desertion or separation from the husband accounts for one of the most serious types
of broken families. Studies show that women are considerably more likely than men to
experience financial hardship following divorce/ desertion. It leaves most women
economically disadvantaged and they face the problem of social insecurity, loneliness, and
face hardship as single parent raising children. Majority of the single mothers either become
dependent on their family, or find themselves working on daily or contract or salary basis.
Their financial condition is vulnerable. For those working women in low income group, a
large portion of the earnings is spent on food, shelter and medicine. While the educated
women may find jobs and financial support, illiterate deserted women live at a bare
subsistence level and face continuing difficulties in providing food, clothing and shelter for
themselves and their children. Training and skill development programmes for these
destitute women are helpful in achieving socio economic development. Thus, financial
assistance through monthly pension and skill development programmes to enhance
employment opportunity for these destitute women will be a welcome step towards their
both economic prosperity and welfare.
In a socially conservative country like India, transgender communities face a much
more daunting, tedious and uphill battle. There is a dire need for a government-conducted
transgender census to identify targeted beneficiaries to be enrolled in the scheme, as well,
government should take necessary steps in guaranteeing rights and entitlements, reservations
50
in education and jobs, provide legal aid, and offer programmes for the skill development for
transgenders.
Leakage in the pension administration system could take many forms including the
incidence of duplicates in the administrative records, fictitious or ghost pensioners (either
due to fake entries in the administrative records or the non-suspension or continuation for
those who have died or moved or are no longer eligible), and through bribes or theft.
Administrative capacity could also influence expressed demand – for instance, complex and
lengthy procedures may discourage potentially eligible individuals to apply for pensions. A
survey based study by Puja (2008) finds that the average time taken for sanctioning pensions
is about six months, with some variation across districts. In the absence of computerized
records, the current requirement of annual physical verification of the pensioner at the
treasury office is not sufficient to check the incidence of fake pensioners. Thus, a well-
designed and computerized system for application processing, record-keeping and
monitoring becomes essential. An online application processing and record keeping system
shall help in effective monitoring system by being able to generate accurate and consistent
aggregate figures at any level of disaggregation and details even at the lowest level of
disaggregation (i.e., the individual pensioner). Such a system would help in weeding process
such as removing the duplication, fake and deceased beneficiaries from the passionaries’ list.
Also, online application processing shall reduce costs involved in administrative process, and
reduce the processing time. Also, providing necessary assistance to the needy applicants
during filling and submission of enrollment online application forms shall be an
encouragement to the new applicants to choose online submission of the application forms.
It could also be used as a platform to link into other state schemes to expand social security,
for instance through the ongoing state life insurance scheme to provide survivor benefits to
BPL households or the recently launched national initiative to provide subsidized health
Insurance for BPL households through the Rashtrya Swasthya Bima Yojna (Puja 2008).
Another important problem is the delay in the disbursal of pensions. At the national
level, the Planning Commission found that 40 per cent of the beneficiaries were not getting
their pension on a regular basis and 18.83 per cent reported that their pension payments had
been delayed by more than 2 months. Second important problem is the unauthorized
payment to the agents delivering the pensions. The Planning Commission reported that this
ranges between Rs. 20 to Rs. 40. The usual practice in the sample study area was to release
51
pension once in two months from the treasury. The time taken for the release of pension
from the treasury to the beneficiary ranges between 10 and 30 days or more. Thus, on the
whole, it takes more than two months for the distribution of pension through post offices in
the district. Thus, it is widely perceived that the current delivery mechanisms cause delays in
the disbursal of the benefits, appropriation of benefits by the middlemen, delivery to benefits
to ineligible persons, etc. In addition, the Revenue Department is also incurring considerable
expenditure in the form of commission to the postal department. One of the measures has
been to deliver pensions with the help of the existing banking network, as current mechanism
of delivering pensions through the postal network has been causing delays (Rajashekar,
2009). Though it is recognized that existing banking network is not as wide as postal
network; hence they may face limitations in reaching out to the remote and far off villages,
Reserve Bank of India has taken many steps to redefine banking in India. Payment banking
is one such initiative from RBI. The Reserve Bank expects payment banks to target India’s
migrant laborers, low-income households and small businesses, offering savings accounts
and remittance services with a low transaction cost. It hopes payments banks will enable
poorer citizens who transact only in cash to take their first step into formal banking. The
innovation is also expected to accelerate India’s journey into a cashless economy. However,
facilitating financial literacy to pensioners particularly in rural areas where the literacy is
generally low, is one of the crucial factors if the pension delivery through banking network
to become a success. Meanwhile, government could continue to use postal network wherever
needed by introducing change in mode of delivery – from MO to postal account.
The Aaadhar seeding can help in identifying fake beneficiaries and detect fraudulent
practices by false claimant. Clear accountability and transparent monitoring would
significantly improve access and quality of entitlements to beneficiaries and the agency
alike. In order to make the pension disbursal system corruption-free and transparent,
government shall link social security scheme beneficiaries’ bank accounts with their Aadhaar
card and make their names public. Such an arrangement will help the government to monitor
whether the intended beneficiaries actually receiving the benefits. It will also facilitate the
government to formulate new social development plans and policies on targeted population.
If the household income is taken into account, as per the present eligibility criteria of
Rs. 12000 PA in Rural areas and Rs. 17000 PA in urban areas for sanction of widow and
disability pension, many households become ineligible. But, in the present context, where
52
that the implementation of NREGP which guarantees a minimum of 100 days of
employment per annum and the revised minimum wage of Rs.224 per day in Karnataka
according to the Minimum Wages Act, as on March 2016. Therefore, it is unlikely that the
annual income of a household would be less than income limits criteria of the scheme, even
if there is one worker in the household, thus fixing such an income limit as eligibility for
sanction of pension appears to be unrealistic. State Government shall contemplate an upward
revision of the income criteria for sanctioning widow and disability pensions. Also, annual
income limit criteria cannot be viewed in isolation. The indebtedness of the household, the
source and purpose of debt will have a bearing on household income. If the household incurs
a debt from a private source for health or consumption purpose or even for investment on
agriculture, there may be no returns or the rate of return is uncertain, which would make it
difficult for the household to repay it. The expenditure pattern, especially on medical
expenses or education or liquor/gambling, should also be taken into account to judge
whether the income puts the household on a sound footing in economic terms. Similarly, the
monthly pension amount shall be revised every two to three years and changed every six
month based on inflation – in the same manner as is done for salaries of government
servants.
53
4 Conclusion
There has been a spurt in the demand for pensions during the last decade as indicated
by the growth in the number of new beneficiaries being added year-on-year basis in the last
five years. This can be attributed to increase in the monthly pension amount and the
proactive role of the government. The steady growth in active pensioners is a step in the right
direction, as indicated by the large-scale coverage of weaker sections including women. The
phenomenal growth in the number of beneficiaries in the SSY and DWP shows that among
the elderly population and widows, there is a higher dependency ratio and pension is one of
the important sources of financial support to them. The steady growth in number of
beneficiaries in the schemes also indicates that these pension schemes are in high demand
in the state.
The above discussion has certain policy implications. The progressive step of RBI
issuing license to setting Payment Banks is a welcome feature. However, facilitating
financial literacy is critical for shifting the pensioners from other payment system to banking
system. Computerization of data, introducing online application processing, and monitoring
systems needs to be expedited to improve the efficiency of the pension administrative
system. Policy regarding the income criteria for the sanction of pension needs to be revised
upwards without any delay so that the deserving potential beneficiaries could be brought
under the purview of pension. Lastly, monthly pension amount shall be revised every two to
three years and changed every six month based on inflation.
54
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