Provision for interim relief for senior citizens and increase in the amount of maintenance are among the amendments needed to The Maintenance and Welfare of Parents and Senior Citizens Act, 2007, to make it more effective in addressing the concerns of senior citizens, said activist Ravindranath Shanbhag.
Mr. Shanbhag, who is part of a three-member committee of the All India Senior Citizens Confederation looking into fine-tuning the Act, said at a seminar here on Sunday that these amendments will be submitted to the Union government after a meeting of the committee in New Delhi on November 3.
He was speaking on ‘Why justice is a mirage for the elderly’ at the seminar organised by Kalpa Trust.
Mr. Shanbhag, who has been dealing with petitions of senior citizens under the Act for four years now, said that the Act presently does not provide interim relief to senior citizens who are thrown out of their homes by their family members or to those seniors in need of maintenance.
“You cannot expect a senior citizen to wait for 90 days, which is the maximum period for the Assistant Commissioner to dispose of the petition,” he said. Presently, it takes a minimum of 18 months to dispose of a petition by a senior citizen.
The activist said the Act should make it mandatory that disputes related to senior citizens should be disposed of within 90 days.
Mr. Shanbhag said the maintenance amount of ₹10,000 per month was too less. The maintenance amount should be 25% of the income earned by family members of the senior citizen.
He said the Act should make the Department of Senior Citizen Welfare the authority to implement the orders passed by the Assistant Commissioner, who heads the district-level Tribunal to hear petitions by senior citizens.
Among the other amendments proposed in the Act is the inclusion of persons, who have influence over senior citizens’ decisions, in the definition of “relatives”.
This was needed to look into cases of usurping of senior citizen’s property by persons other than the family members, he said.
Mr. Shanbhag decreed some of Deputy Commissioners for hearing appeal against order of the Assistant Commissioner in favour of senior persons.
Appeals can be heard by the High Court and not by the Deputy Commissioners, he said.