With an intention to provide succour to the women who lost their husbands, and persons who lost their limbs in recent cloudburst on June 14-15, the Vijay Bahuguna Government is going to wipe their tears by providing them widow and handicapped pension as well.
For this, Chief Minister is going to bring these issues in the next Cabinet meeting, which is scheduled to happen on Monday. Sources said that if this happens, then Chief Minister Vijay Bahuguna, who is consistently being targeted by the Opposition including within the Congress, will be able to tackle his detractors.
Sources said that State Government is consistently saying that disbursal of cheques would not be the last help from the State side. With this announcement chief minister is making all effort to send the message that state government is with you all the time. Sources further said that Congress-led State Government is also going to bring and issue about Rs 15,000 cash assistance to those whose house received damage partially due to natural calamity.
Till now State Government used to pay compensation or ex-gratia amount to the widow or family members in bulk. Thereafter, the State was not paying any heed to the widow. Sometime it was being noticed that widows were not entertained by their relative after few years. If this decision is taken in the Cabinet meeting, then widows would earn respect among the family.
Earlier state government had decided to pay Rs 25,000 cash reward to the widow. It means missing relative would get Rs 5 lakh as ex-gratia amount and Rs 25,000 additional money to the widow. If this happens then widow would get a fix amount per month as a part of widow pension.
This would be completely different from widow pension or handicapped pension, which were being disbursed by the social welfare department. Earlier, handicapped persons, who was handicapped by birth, were getting pension from social welfare department. If this happen then handicapped person, who lost their limb in natural calamity, would also get pension per month. Source said that with these pension State Government wants to make them independent.