Digital life certificates for continuation of pensions to be scrapped soon: 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, Dr. Jitendra Singh has said the practice of submitting digital life certificates for continuation of pensions will soon be done away with. Inaugurating an Awareness Workshop on the online Pension Sanction and Payment Tracking System ‘BHAVISHYA’ here today, Dr. Jitendra Singh said the Department of Pension & Pensioners’ Welfare (P&PW) has introduced and fast-tracked several innovative steps in the last few months.

Dr. Jitendra Singh said the pensioners have assumed priority since there are more pensioners now than serving employees. This has come about due to rising life expectancy, he added. The Minister said apart from ensuring timely disbursal of pension, the Department is also holding pre-retirement counselling for employees and considering various options on how best to utilize the experience of retired personnel who can contribute a lot to the government and society as they are energetic and resourceful for long beyond 60 years of age. Dr. Jitendra Singh said Anubhav is another innovative step where retiring employees will share their experience for the benefit of posterity. On the occasion, Dr. Jitendra Singh presented Bhavishya ID Cards to three personnel retiring this month end.

Secretary, P&PW and Secretary, Department of Administrative Reforms and Public Grievances, Shri Devendra Chaudhary said this portal will benefit more than 50,000 employees retiring every year. Head of Offices (HOO)/Drawing & Disbursing Officers (DDO) of all Ministries/Departments including Attached and Subordinate Offices located in Delhi participated in the one day workshop.

The Bhavishya system will introduce transparency and establish accountability in the pension sanction and payment process. It will help to eliminate delays and bring satisfaction to the retiring employees and pensioners. As on date, Bhavishya is being implemented in main Secretariat of 83 Ministries/Departments and 17 attached offices involving 783 DDOs which are in various stages of processing pension cases of 4,066 retiring employees. The web application has so far finally processed and issued PPOs in respect of 652 pensioners. In due course, all the DDOs in various Ministries/Departments and their attached and subordinate offices, numbering over 9,000, would be brought under the ambit of Bhavishya.

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