Competent Committee constituted to scrutinize all BPL lists

Lakhs of people, whose cases were pending, will benefit

Responding to the long-pending demand of the people, the government today took a bold decision to frame a Committee to update Below Poverty Line (BPL) lists in the State.

The Committee of officers of Consumer Affairs and Public Distribution (CA&PD), Rural Development and Revenue Departments will jointly scrutinize and reconcile BPL lists as prepared by CA&PD and Rural Development Departments. The Members of the Committee will be nominated by the respective Administrative Secretaries.

The Committee has been formed with a view to determine the exact Below Poverty Line (BPL) population in the State and rectify variations which have arisen as a result of adoption of different figures by various departments.

It has also been ordered that reports prepared will be submitted to the Planning and Development Department within a period of three months from the date of issuance of the order. The Planning and Development Department will examine these reports and submit them along with its recommendations to the government.

According to the government order, in urban areas like Municipal Corporations, Municipal Councils, Town Area Committees and Notified Area Committees, a joint verification will be conducted by a team of officers of CAPD, Housing and Urban Development and Revenue Departments for the purpose.

The team will use existing BPL list of the CAPD as the basic data for verification. Deputy Commissioners and Tehsildars have been designated as the nodal authorities for carrying out the re-verification within their respective jurisdictions.

It has been further ordered that the persons, who figure in both the lists of CAPD and Rural Development Departments, will be retained as persons or households entitled to BPL related benefits. The persons who figure in only one of the lists will be subjected to further verification by the Committees to be formed by virtue of the order.

The Committees will adhere to the criteria approved by Union Ministries of Consumer Affairs and Rural Development Department to determine future status of such persons who figure in one list only.

As per this criteria, households headed by widows or terminally ill persons or disabled persons or persons aged 60 years or more with no assured means of subsistence or societal support are entitled to be in the BPL category.

Widows, terminally ill persons, disabled persons and persons aged 60 years or more, single women and single men with no assured means of subsistence or societal support are also eligible to be retained in the BPL list.

The criteria also provide for inclusion of all primitive tribal households in the BPL category. However, the tribal beneficiaries under the expanded AAY should be in proportion to the tribal population in the State.

Landless agriculture labourers, marginal farmers, rural artisans and craftsmen such as potters, weavers, blacksmiths, carpenters, slum dwellers, and persons earning livelihood on daily basis in the informal sector like porters, coolies, rickshaw pullers, hand cart pullers, fruit and flower sellers, snake charmers, rag pickers, destitute and other similar categories in both rural and urban areas have also been included in the category.

The criteria also provides for determining size of group of operational holding of land, type of house, average availability of normal wear clothing, food security. Sanitation, electric fan, kitchen appliances, literacy status of the highest literate adult, status of the household labour force, means of livelihood, status of children, type of indebtedness, reason for migration from household.

Specialized assistance, if any, needed in the conduct of above re-verification process, will be provided by Directorate of Economics and Statistics, the order adds.