But with delay in the distribution of the allowance, she has been relying on her family for medication, placing an extra financial burden on them. She has not received her social security allowance for the past eight months.[break]
“I was managing somehow to buy the medicine with that amount. But now I have to rely on my family,” said Ojha. “Months have elapsed waiting for the allowance and now I feel it will never come.”
Like Ojha, there are 5,679 people in Biratnagar Sub-metropolitan city waiting for their social security allowance since January.
Altogether 64,279 people--senior citizens, disabled people, Dalits and single women -- qualify for social security allowance in Morang. But the district has not received the allowance budget since the beginning of fiscal year 2012/13.
The District Development Committee (DDC) has stopped allocations of the allowance, citing the budget crunch. The 65 Village Development committees (VDCs) have failed to provide the allowance to eligible citizens. According to Local Development Officer Sivaram Pokharel, the DDC has been repeatedly demanding that the Ministry allocate Rs 33,479,000, which is outstanding under the social security allowance head.
“Complaints about the allowance are frequent at our office. We have not received the budget despite frequent requests to the Ministry,” said Pokharel. He also informed that the allowance budget has fallen short as only one third of national budget has been sanctioned and most of this was spent on development work. Last year, Rs 286,594,800 was allocated for social security allowance in the district.
“It has been two month since the new fiscal year started. However, we are yet to receive the allowance budget from the ministry. We are planning to allocate some money before the Dashain festival and are looking for alternatives,” Pokharel informed.
Meanwhile, investigations are yet to be initiate into misappropriations of social security allowance in the district. Last year, senior citizen allowances in the name of 25 people in the district were found to have been allocated even one and half years after their deaths. Locals have been accusing the VDC secretaries of taking the amount themselves through the use of fake vouchers.
“We have information about misuse of the allowance. I will take stock of things,” said Pokharel. The DDC is yet to update data on people eligible for the allowance even though two month of the new fiscal year have already elapsed.
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