Several modifications to Subhadra Yojana approved by Odisha cabinet, see details

Bhubaneswar: Several changes to much popular Subhadra Yojana has been approved by the Odisha cabinet on Wednesday said reliable reports. On 22nd August, 2024, the Odisha State Cabinet approved Subhadra-a flagship scheme to financially empower women, and provide safety nets to them and their families with a budget allocation of Rs. 55,825 crores for a period of 5 years.

Till date, more than 1 crore applicants have registered themselves on the portal. More than 60 lakh beneficiaries have been approved in 2 phases. While processing the registered applications to find out the eligible beneficiaries from among NFSA/SFSS database it was decided to complete the exercise with the available data in respect of the following categories current or former Member of Parliament (MP) or Member of the Legislative Assembly (MLA), income Tax Payee, regular or contractual employee in State Government or Government of India or Public Sector Undertaking or Board or Local Body or Government Organization or person receiving pension after retirement and elected / nominated/ appointed representative in any Government Department or Undertaking or Board or Organization of Government of India or State Government.

This decision was taken as these persons would ordinarily not be receiving benefits under NFSA/SFSS. All applicants have also given a signed certificate that they do not fall in any of the exclusion criteria. Further, there are provisions under the scheme to take legal action and initiate full recovery if it is found that someone has fraudulently taken benefit under the scheme. The goal of the government was to reduce any kind of harassment to the people and hence, technology was used to centrally link with different databases. To ask for fresh certificates would have created inconvenience and made each applicant provide fresh documents.

Waiting for the data to be further sanitized would have caused unnecessary delay in people receiving the benefits. The anxiety of people might have also led to rent-seeking in the field. It is pertinent to mention here that beneficiaries of the scheme are women who are the most vulnerable and deprived section of society and hence, all steps need to be taken to prevent any further harassment of women by middlemen and other unscrupulous elements.

For similar reasons, to reduce the inconvenience to the applicants changes to Subhadra Yojana have been approved, to speed up submission of application forms on the portal, it was decided to delink the SUBHADRA portal from the Aadhaar e-KYC module for the period from September 8, 2024 to September 13, 2024. Instead, verification of e-KYC was through other database like NFSA and PM KISAN.

Further, it was decided for introduction of CBDC as part of Odisha’s commitment to transparency and digital financial inclusion. Similarly, given the low use of Debit cards by people and the greater use of UPI or Aadhar based payments, it was decided to not issue debit cards under SUBHADRA.

Besides, in order to make changes to Subhadra Yojana more transparent, it is proposed to include two Civil Society (non-official) representatives in the BLSC & ULSC, who shall be nominated by the concerned chairpersons of the Block/ULB level scrutiny committee. The para 9.1.e and 9.1.g of the SUBHADRA guideline needs to be amended to this extent.

In view of the above, the Cabinet in its meeting dated 23.10.2024 approved the following:

The deviations from the exclusion criteria as listed in the scheme guidelines with respect to applicants present in NFSA/SFSS database in light of the justification provided above and the resultant list of eligible beneficiaries submitted by OCAC.
Inclusion of CBDC as a mode of providing financial assistance under Subhadra.
Non issuance of ATM-cum-debit card for Subhadra.
The delinking of portal from the Aadhaar e-KYC module for the period from September 8 to September 13 and in lieu of that verification of e-KYC through other database like NFSA and PM KISAN.
Modification of para 9.1.e and 9.1.g of the SUBHADRA guideline in order to include two Civil Society (non-official) representatives in the BLSC/ ULSC, who shall be nominated by the concerned chairpersons of the Block/ ULB level scrutiny committee.