Dr. Jitendra Singh, Union Minister of State (Independent Charge) for Development of North Eastern Region (DoNER), MoS PMO, Personnel, Public Grievances, Pensions, Atomic Energy and Space, chaired 31st meeting of Standing Committee of Voluntary Agencies (SCOVA), held at Vigyan Bhawan, New Delhi.
The 31st SCOVA meeting was organised by Department of Pensions & Pensioners’ Welfare (DoP&PW), Union Ministry of Personnel, Public Grievances & Pensions.
Key Highlights of Meet
Minister emphasized on maximum digitization of documentation process dealing with pensioners’ cases.
Retired employees are a healthy and productive workforce for India and therefore the government needs to streamline and channelize their energies in a productive direction.
DoP&PW should be reoriented in such a way that pensioners become a part of nation building process. One should learn from pensioners’ experience such as a retired person could do counseling for pensioners in his respective field of expertise.
On the demand of SCOVA members, Minister agreed to hold its meeting bi-annually instead of once a year and also directed for prompt and time bound redressal of grievances of pensioners.
Department of Pensions has already-
- Digitalized process of providing life certificate by pensioners and other documents.
- Started Pension Adalats through video conferencing. Therefore, interaction process between Government Departments and Pensioners has increased manifold with the use of technology.
- Started Pensioners’ Portal where one can easily check PPO status. Thus, optimizing use of technology for welfare of pensioners.
SCOVA has gone a long way in addressing issues related to Pensioners in a focused manner.