Chandigarh, December 22: After completion of audit on illegal social security pension beneficiaries, the cash-strapped Punjab government has released Rs 80 crore pension amount for the month of April only. The probe had found 93,521 persons illegally drawing pensions while 72,928 beneficiaries were deceased.
A senior official of the social welfare department stated that the amount had been disbursed to the banks and it would be transferred into beneficiaries’ accounts in a day or two.
Kavita Singh, director of social security and development of women and children department, said the department had moved the file for taking appropriate action against the delinquent officials and recovery of pension from illegal beneficiaries. She added that the department had also moved the case for release of pension amount till November and it was upto the finance department to clear the bills.
After coming to power, the Congress government had ordered re-verification of all 19.87 lakh social security pension beneficiaries in the state. During the probe it came out that 51,328 such beneficiaries were underage, 9,839 did not fulfil the maximum income criteria and 32,354 owned land more than the maximum cap put by the government for being eligible for the scheme.
