Vijayawada: Andhra Pradesh govt has opened the doors for grant of new ration cards and welfare pensions. Chief minister N Chandrababu Naidu recently promised to remove the hurdles in issuance of ration cards and also grant of pensions. Subsequently, the govt issued orders to receive applications from Monday. The new applications will be accepted till Dec 28.
The govt has also decided to issue the new ration cards as Sankranti gift after completion of field level verifications. The new ration card applicants earlier had to wait for long as the previous YSRCP govt cleared them only twice in a year. Applicants who missed the first spell of releases had to wait for another six months to get the card despite getting clearances from the field level administration.
The previous regime was also rigid with grant of new welfare pensions and trimmed several thousand beneficiaries from the lists. It had also introduced new guidelines by making the parents or kin of outsourced employees, ANMs, anganwadi workers, and even sanitation workers ineligible to get the pensions citing that their family income exceeded the maximum cap set for grant of pensions.
Taking the grievances of people into consideration, Naidu directed officials to grant new ration cards without any delay. The govt has also decided to replace old ration cards issued with YS Jagan Mohan Reddy’s photo and issue new cards with the official emblem. The civil supplies department has decided to issue the new cards as and when the field verification is completed. The ward/village secretariat staff have been directed to complete the physical verification of applicants within a fortnight of receiving the application.
