Rasulpur: Errors in Aadhaar cards are causing significant difficulties for beneficiaries. Whether it’s transferring government grants to beneficiaries’ bank accounts, adding names to ration cards, conducting e-KYC, providing financial assistance to pension beneficiaries, or disbursing funds for schemes like KALIA and BALIA for farmers, Aadhaar-related issues are becoming a major hurdle. If there are discrepancies in Aadhaar details, beneficiaries are being deprived of their rightful benefits. Since the Government of India has adopted Aadhaar as an independent identification document, such problems have been increasingly observed.
Although the Supreme Court has clarified that Aadhaar is not mandatory for availing government schemes, in practice, government offices unofficially enforce it as a requirement.
Due to these challenges, common people are facing numerous difficulties. A glaring example of this is the distribution of enhanced pension amounts. In Rasulpur block, over a hundred pension beneficiaries have been denied their rightful pension due to age-related discrepancies in their Aadhaar cards. Differences between the age recorded in voter ID and Aadhaar are creating hurdles. Correcting age information in Aadhaar or voter ID is a complicated process.
The district administration has imposed restrictions on correcting age details in Aadhaar and voter ID for pension eligibility. As a result, many elderly individuals are unable to receive their enhanced pension benefits.
Both the central and state governments provide financial aid to eligible beneficiaries, including elderly individuals, widows, persons with disabilities, abandoned women, and unmarried senior women, through social security schemes. The majority of pension beneficiaries are elderly. To qualify for pension benefits, an individual’s age must be 60 or above in their voter ID. Based on this, beneficiaries receive pension assistance. However, since Aadhaar has now been considered an independent identity proof, it has led to multiple complications.
Many elderly beneficiaries whose voter ID shows their age as above 80 but Aadhaar records indicate a lower age are being deprived of the enhanced pension of ₹3,500, which was increased from ₹1,200 in January this year. Due to such discrepancies, senior citizen organizations are raising objections.
Krushna Chandra Sahu, president of the Maa Hengula Senior Citizens Organization, argues that the government’s policy of increasing pension is unfair. He questions why a 79-year-old person receives ₹1,000 while an 80-year-old gets ₹3,500, calling it highly irrational. Additionally, considering Aadhaar age as the sole criterion for pension eligibility is legally questionable. Beneficiaries demand that only voter ID age should be accepted as proof for pension eligibility, urging the government to resolve this issue fairly.
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