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Report No. 10 of 2023 - Performance Audit of National Social Assistance Programme - Union Government (Civil), Ministry of Rural Development (Performance Audit)

Date on which Report Tabled:

Tue 08 Aug, 2023

Date of sending the report to Government

Government Type

Union

Union Department

Civil

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Sector Agriculture and Rural Development

Overview

Concise Overview

This Report contains significant results of the Performance Audit of National Social Assistance Programme covering the period from 2017-18 to 2020-21.

NSAP aims to provide basic financial support to old age, widow and severely disabled persons from BPL list as well as to BPL families in case of death of primary breadwinner. NSAP is being implemented in both rural as well as urban areas in all States and UTs. The Ministry of Rural Development, being the administering Ministry, releases the funds sub-scheme-wise to all States/UTs based on annual allocations. During 2017-21, Government of India allocated ₹ 34,432 crore for NSAP. Further, States and UTs also allocated ₹ 1,09,573 crore, as additional assistance for pension and for coverage of additional beneficiaries.

NSAP reached out to 2.83 crore beneficiaries annually, on an average, during 2017-21. In addition, 1.82 crore beneficiaries were covered by States/UTs, on an average, during the said period.

Considering the substantial financial outlays and criticality of achieving its intended outcomes, the All-India Performance Audit of NSAP was taken up to evaluate the implementation of NSAP at the national level and recommend corrective action. Due to non-verification of existing beneficiaries as well as due to lack of data cleaning, verification and authentication, cases of ineligible beneficiaries drawing benefits were noticed in many States/UTs. Further, in many States/UTs, pension was not being paid on monthly basis. The Scheme is not fully DBT compliant as pension is being paid in cash in some States. There were cases of over-payment, short-payment and multiple pension payments noticed in many States/UTs. The monitoring, social-audit and grievance redressal mechanism were not effective in terms of deficiencies being noticed during the implementation of the Scheme.

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Report No. 10 of 2023 - Performance Audit of National Social Assistance Programme - Union Government (Civil), Ministry of Rural Development (Performance Audit)
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