Govt to increase allowance for people with disabilities

The government has planned to increase the insolvent disabled allowance to about 55 per cent under the Social Safety Net Programme (SSNP) in fiscal 2019-20.

Social Welfare Minister Nuruzzaman Ahmed said this at the parliament on Tuesday.

“The Social Safety Net Programme will be expanded. In fiscal 2019-20, the government plans to increase the old age allowance to 10 per cent, while widow allowance to 21.43 per cent and the insolvent disabled allowance to 54.5 per cent under the SSNP,” he said while replying a tabled question placed by ruling party lawmaker Shamsun Nahar (women Seat-13 in the Jatiya Sangsad here.

Responding to another tabled question placed by treasury bench lawmaker Md Israfil Alam (Naogaon-6), Nuruzzaman informed the House that about 4.0 million beneficiaries got old age allowance in fiscal 2018-19, while around 1.4  million women received widow allowance and about 10 people got disabled allowance.

The social welfare minister said a programme continues to set up a digital information storage inserting a list of the names of SSNP beneficiaries through the Management information System (MIS), reports UNB.