The Hindu : Action plan to tackle beggar menace

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Thursday, Feb 27, 2003

Southern States

Southern States - Kerala-Thiruvananthapuram

Action plan to tackle beggar menace

By Our Staff Reporter

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM Feb. 26. The City Corporation will take up a rehabilitation scheme for beggars and introduce a ban on begging from mid-March. This was decided at a meeting of Corporation functionaries, Government agencies and NGOs convened here today.

The meeting chalked out an action plan aimed at ending the beggar menace in the city. This involves the setting up of a rehabilitation centre with counselling, medical assistance and vocational training facilities and a strategy to identify and discourage organised begging rackets. The action plan also includes a separate rehabilitation scheme for street children.

Presiding over the meeting, the Mayor, J. Chandra, said a rehabilitation centre was being set up at a Corporation-owned building at Kothalam in the Fort area. The meeting approved a proposal to name the scheme as `Veedu'.

The programme will be implemented by a charitable society chaired by the Mayor. The Welfare Standing Committee chairman, M. Vinodkumar, presented the draft of the bylaws for the proposed society. An ad hoc committee has been constituted for the scheme with the Mayor as chairperson and the Corporation Secretary as member secretary.

Prof. Chandra said the scheme was not intended as a shelter but as a comprehensive rehabilitation package aimed at providing opportunities to bring derelicts to the mainstream of social life. The society will have a general council and a director board, both headed by the Mayor.

The official members in the society include the Mayor, Deputy Mayor, chairmen of standing committees, City Police Commissioner, District Collector, District Social Welfare Officer, Corporation Secretary and Health Officer. The non-official panel comprises Government and private orphanages, care homes, NGOs, traders and media representatives.

The director board will comprise the Ministers for Local Administration and Social Welfare as patrons and the MP and MLAs from the city as special invitees. Six members will be elected from the general council. The Corporation Secretary will be the member secretary of the board and the Welfare committee chairman the vice chairman. The board will also have a convener to look after the day-to-day activities.

Several NGOs who participated in the meeting highlighted the need to check politicisation of the society and prevent infiltration by vested interests. Opposing the proposal for life membership, the Mayor said many members might lose interest in the project after a while. She suggested an annual membership scheme. Many NGOs wanted charitable institutions to be exempted from membership fee. The Corporation Secretary, P. Venugopal, said an expert committee would be constituted to advice the society on the rehabilitation package.

The chairman of the Works Standing Committee, V.S. Padmakumar, the Additional District Magistrate and heads of various departments in the Corporation were present.

The Mayor said the Corporation was collecting data on the beggars to root out the organised begging rackets and identify the beneficiaries for the rehabilitation scheme. She said some of the beggars could be considered for the Corporation's sanitation workforce where they could be of help in segregation of plastics from garbage. She said the ailing beggars would be provided medical assistance. The Mayor will meet senior police officials, the District Collector and the Railway Police authorities on March 4 to discuss means to check the traffic of beggars from the neighbouring States.

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Action plan to tackle beggar menace