Soon, pension for people with 49 per cent disability

A government order said that ‘Destitute Differently Abled Pension Scheme” shall be called ‘Differently abled Pension Scheme’ and unemployed youths with 40 per cent and above disability shall be eligible under the scheme instead of disability with 60 per cent and above. 

The announcement was made by Chief Minister Edappadi K Palaniswami in the assembly. Representations from the differently abled associations cited the difficulties they face in availing pension due to lack of definition of word ‘Unemployed’ for the grant of pension for differently abled. 

The order further said that differently abled people working in permanent jobs in government departments, government undertakings and government aided institutions including educational institutions will not be eligible for the scheme. 

Similarly, those employed in private sector on a permanent basis and drawing regular monthly salaries whose annual income exceeds Rs 3 lakh also will not eligible for pension. 

Likewise, differently abled person, who are self-employed and whose annual income exceeds Rs 3 lakh cannot avail pension scheme. The government also issued orders to disburse the pensions through banks on identification of beneficiaries through bio-metric enabled smart cards.