Govt readies to expand DBT but concerns linger

Not least,according to the minutes of a review meeting convened by the planning commission on June 6,the confusion about who would be responsible for biometric enrollment of beneficiaries. Of the 78 districts,the Registrar General of India is responsible for enrollment in 33. The RGI has,however,emphasised that the onus of getting beneficiaries to enrollment centres should not be on it because “unlike UIADI,it does not have the funds to incentivise enrollment”. The secretary,planning commission,is learnt to have said that mobilising beneficiaries was neither the responsibility of the RGI nor the UIADI but of concerned ministries.

The commission has also advised targeted rather than universal enrollment. “Ministries must only target beneficiaries availing of benefits under the identified schemes in these 121 districts. The onus of implementation is completely on them,” the minutes read.

The meeting also flagged several other problems facing DBT. The rural development ministry pointed out that of the 49 lakh beneficiaries of its National Social Assistance Programme,only 14 per cent have bank accounts,40 per cent have post office accounts and only nine percent have Aadhar.

The planning commission,however,maintained that “irrespective of mode of disbursement,Aadhar enrollment is mandatory”.

DBT is in place in 43 districts and covers 25 schemes as of now. But its implementation has been far from satisfactory. The women and child development ministry,whose Indira Gandhi Matritva Sahyog Yojana is part of DBT,told the June 6 meeting that though 45 per cent of the scheme’s beneficiaries have bank accounts,40 per cent have post office accounts and 21 per cent have both bank accounts and Aadhar. Seeding has been done for only 11 per cent and just 3.4 per cent of the beneficiaries have received payments through Aadhar Bridge Payment System so far.

To this,the plan panel said that the gap between seeding and payments through Aadhar-based systems needed to be “looked into”. The financial services department said the progress of seeding was being “hampered due to poor quality” of databases: wrong entries,same Aadhar number for several beneficiaries,duplication of bank account numbers.

The health and family welfare ministry pointed out that banks were unwilling to open no-frills accounts because they have not received guidelines for opening such accounts.

The plan panel has been holding periodic meetings with collectors and other officials to review the DBT’s progress,which hasn’t been satisfactory so far. Experts blame lack of adequate planning for the lackluster performance.

“The government just went ahead with the scheme without planning. Enough preparatory work was not done. Enrollment has been very low even in pilot districts and,in fact,DBT has caused disruption in payment of pensions,” economist and activist Ritika Khera said.