Andhra Pradesh government taps village, ward-level secretariat staff to disburse pensions after volunteers barred

Related: EC bars Andhra Pradesh govt’s ward, village volunteers from executing duties

Barring of ‘volunteers’

The YS Jagan Mohan Reddy-led YSRCP government introduced the decentralised governance delivery mechanism through ward and village volunteers. Each volunteer looks after 50 households.

In essence, they are meant to ensure last-mile delivery of the Andhra Pradesh government’s welfare schemes.

However, Opposition parties in the state believe these volunteers are the eyes and ears of the YSRCP, often collecting sensitive data that could be exploited for the elections.

And they may have good reason to harbour such a belief: In May last year, Chief Minister YS Jagan Mohan Reddy openly urged the volunteers across the state to reach out to the people and thwart the “vicious and malicious propaganda” unleashed by the “jealous TDP” and its friendly media houses against his government.

In February, the EC ordered that the volunteers were barred from participating in any election-related work in the state.

The new EC order has the following stipulations on volunteers and the state government:

1. Volunteers are barred from the distribution of cash benefits under any scheme — including pensions — to eligible beneficiaries.
2. Handheld devices — like mobile phones and tablets — provided to the volunteers are to be deposited with the district election officers till the Model Code of Conduct is in place.
3. The Andhra Pradesh government has been asked to make alternative arrangements to distribute benefits of ongoing schemes using DBT (electronic transfer) — preferably — or through other regular government employees.

Given these instructions, the state government is said to have decided to disburse the pensions through all village and ward-level secretariat staff throughout the course of the elections.

Related: Who are the ‘volunteers’ — loved by YSRCP and hated by Opposition?

Guidelines for secretariat staff

The Department of Rural Development issued the following guidelines for the disbursement of pensions throughout the elections:

1. Pension disbursement will be done at only the village and ward secretariat offices, by all the village and ward secretariat staff.
2. Mandal parishad development officers (MPDOs) or municipal commissioners (MCs) are to issue authorisation letters to panchayat secretaries and welfare and education assistants (WEAs) in rural areas and ward administrative secretaries and ward welfare development secretaries (WWDSes) in urban areas for carrying cash from banks to their Secretariats. The letters — with details of the secretariat and the amount — are available on their MPDO or MC logins.
3. A copy of the letters should be sent to the concerned returning officers.
4. Panchayat secretaries and WEAs in rural areas and ward administrative secretaries and WWDSes in urban areas are to withdraw cash from the bank and hand it over to the secretariat staff.
5. The WEAs and WWDSes have been directed to collect cash from all secretariat staff on the closing of disbursement every day. The cash balance should be informed to MPDOs and MC every day.
6. Logins will be provided to all village and ward Secretariat staff. They have been directed to download the pension disbursement app on their mobile phones. The entire secretariat pension list will be enabled for all the secretariat staff. Digital assistants have been requested to provide Finger Print Scanner devices to secretariat staff.
7. A manual for the disbursement of pensions through the secretariat staff user will be provided. WEAs and WWDSes have been directed to explain the disbursement process to all the village and ward secretariat staff.
8. The secretariat staff will disburse the pension amount after duly obtaining Aadhaar authentication — through the scan of biometrics, iris or the face.
9. In case of failure of Aadhaar authentication, the pension is to be disbursed using the Real-time Beneficiary Identification System (RBIS) mode.
10. For offline secretariats, devices used for disbursement of pensions should be mapped in the MPDO or MC logins. All village and ward secretariat staff have been directed to download the data and disburse pensions after duly obtaining the authentication.
11. No publicity is to be given to the disbursement of pensions. Pension disbursement photos and videos are to be avoided.
12. The staff engaged in the disbursement are to adhere to the MCC, and any deviation would be viewed seriously.

(Edited by Arkadev Ghoshal)