Date:16/02/2008 URL: http://www.thehindu.com/2008/02/16/stories/2008021653600400.htm

Karnataka - Bangalore

‘We too have a right to lead a dignified life’

Staff Reporter

— Photo: V. Sreenivasa Murthy

seeking action: Members of the All-India Pensioned-cum-Senior Citizens Retirees’ Association highlighting their demands in Bangalore on Friday.

BANGALORE: The All-India Pensioned-cum-Senior Citizens Retirees’ Association on Friday urged the Union government to create a social security fund for them and bring them either under the Central Government Health Scheme or the Yashasvini scheme, introduced by the Karnataka Government.

“Like our counterparts who retired from government service, we too, having served towards nation-building, have a right to lead a dignified life. However, the policies and practices of the Union Government restrain us from leading a dignified life,” said Ernest Abraham, general secretary of the association.

Mr. Abraham told presspersons here that those who retired prior to the introduction of Employees’ Pension Scheme in 1995 were deprived of any social security or healthcare facility. Though they had got provident fund and gratuity on superannuation, the amount got used in discharging a whole range of commitments. Even the deposited sums in bank or post office accounts fetched meagre interest these days, making life miserable, Mr. Abraham rued.

He said many banks and public sector undertakings had of late set up social security funds for the benefit of non-pensioned employees and the Centre should set up a fund on the same lines, after collecting some cess, if necessary. The Centre’s move to enact legislation compelling children to take care of their parents lacked practicability as none intended to strain their relationship with children.

While the country was emulating the developed countries in many economic respects, it had failed to do so in the social security front.