National Council for Older Persons (NCOP) was constituted in 1999 in accordance with the National Policy for Older Persons (NPOP).
Key Points
- It was constituted under the Chairpersonship of Minister for Social Justice and Empowerment.
- The council look after the implementation of the Policy and advise the Government to formulate and implement policy and programmes for senior citizens.
Reconstitution of NCOP
NCOP was reconstituted in 2012 to encourage more participation from every region. Council was renamed as National Council of Senior Citizens (NCSrC).
Meeting of NCOP
- Third meeting of the Council was held in June, 2018.
- Issues like Schemes, Programmes and Act were discussed in the meeting for the welfare of Senior Citizens.
- Status or action taken by the Government is listed below:
- Council suggested to strengthen the “Amendments to the Maintenance and Welfare of Parents and Senior Citizens (MWPSC) Act, 2007”. Following it, government introduced “Maintenance and Welfare of Parents and Senior Citizens (Amendment) Bill, 2019” in the Lok Sabha.
- Council suggested to organise more distribution camps under Rashtriya Vayoshri Yojana (RYY). Based on this, Department of Social Justice and Empowerment revised RVY to cover all the districts across country.
- Council also advised to simplify the process of registration of NGOs following which, Department of Social Justice and Empowerment has been running a simplified Online NGO portal called e-Anudaan.
- It suggests to provide financial assistance to senior citizens who are cancer patients from Senior Citizen’s Welfare Fund (SCWF). In line with the suggestion, government is providing financial assistance of up to Rs 2 lakh under Rashtriya Arogya Nidhi (RAN) scheme.