No takers for Shaadi Mubarak scheme

Lack of clear guidelines hits the programme

Hyderabad: The Shaadi Mubarak scheme, which was launched by the Telangana State government amidst much fanfare, is bogged down due to frequent transfer of officials and lack of staff in the Minority Welfare Department to implement it.

Due to staff crunch, the officials are unable to send field staff for verification of the applications and to create awareness among the poorer sections about the scheme.

According to officials, they had already written to the District Collectors seeking to allot staff to make the scheme a success. However, no action had so far been taken in this regard, according to an official who was recently transferred from Minority Welfare to Revenue department.

The shortage of staff also resulted in large number of applications remaining pending with the department. The government targeted to help 19,607 beneficiaries and received 3,921 applications of which 1,705 are pending verification. During the last four months, only 2,129 applications were sanctioned the money, sources told The Hans India.

The Hyderabad District has a minority population of around 16.9 lakh. The government had targeted to help 7,723 beneficiaries and allocated Rs 39.39 crore funds. However, it received only 1,098 applications till February 14. While Karimnagar has targeted to help 1,078 with a budge of Rs 5.49 crore, it received only 275 applications. Similar is the status of other districts in Telangana.

Community-wise, only 3,888 applications from Muslims were received, though the government intended to help 7,515. From Christian community, only 19 applications were received though the target was 1,747. From Sikh minorities only 12 applications were received out of targeted 110. “If the applicants come up with all the supported documents, we will clear them,” said another district official.

The officials also said that there were many issues which were hampering speedy clearance of applications. For example, they were not clear if the benefits can be extended to two girls of the same family. There were no clear guidelines, the officials rued.

Another problem which the beneficiaries were facing was insistence on producing birth and income certificates. Majority of the poorer sections would not have income or birth certificates.

“There are thousands of girls, who did not study even up 10th standard. It has become nearly impossible for them to get the certificates. Even those who are applying for these certificates are shelling out thousands of rupees as cut to middlemen,” says Mujeeb, who recently applied under the scheme.

With the financial year coming to an end soon, the officials are finding it difficult to meet the targets. They are now considering erecting boards with posters of the scheme near community centres like mosques and flexi boards at various places to give wide publicity to the sc heme.

By: Md Nizamuddin