Telangana to provide Rs 10 lakh each in financial assistance to poor Dalit families

CM K Chandrasekhar Rao called for an all-party meeting on Sunday, June 27 to discuss and finalise the guidelines of the CM Dalit Empowerment Programme that is being initiated by the state government. A decision was taken in the meeting to provide Rs 10 lakh financial assistance each directly to the bank accounts of eligible beneficiaries from the Dalit community. It was also decided to earmark Rs 1200 crore for the empowerment programme. 

 According to the government, the CM Dalit Empowerment Programme aims to make members of the community financially self-sufficient. In the first phase, from the total 119 assembly constituencies, 100 families from each constituency across the state will be provided with assistance. This means, as per the government’s plan, a total of 11,900 people will benefit from the programme in the first phase. The money would be transferred directly to the bank accounts of the eligible beneficiaries.

 The all-party meeting felt that the proposed CM Dalit Empowerment Programme would bring in a qualitative change in the lives of Dalits and the Chief Minister's ideas for Dalit empowerment have become a role model for the country. The meet was attended by CPI, Congress and other political parties; the BJP had abstained from the meeting. KCR said that the all-party meeting was convened to make Dalits stakeholders stand unitedly by them, remove their inferiority and to bring in a qualitative change in their thought process and attitude.

 The meeting, which saw representatives from several parties, lasted for around 11 hours. Several MPs, MLAs, MLCs from the Dalit community were part of the meeting. Speaking on the occasion, CM Sri KCR said, “It is a blot on Indian society that Dalits are subjected to social and economic discrimination. This is deeply bothering all of us. The Telangana State government has introduced several schemes and programmes for the development and welfare of Dalits. It has attained qualitative change in the agriculture and education sectors. But yet with an aim to set the Dalit families who are under the poverty line move towards development, CM Dalit Empowerment Programme is being introduced at a cost of Rs 1200 Crores.”

 “The State Government is ready to implement a phased-wise action plan to remove social and economic problems of Dalits. The CM urged the all-party meeting to give suggestions to make Dalits move forward in the society with confidence they too can progress, to make transparent policies for the empowerment of Dalits, which give no room for any manipulation and wanted the suggestions to be above the party politics,” read the note.

During the meeting, KCR directed the officials to identify the social and economic problems of Dalits and find out solutions for them. CM Dalit Empowerment programme would be implemented along with other welfare and envelopment schemes of Dalits. The Chief Minister wanted regular monitoring of the beneficiaries of all the schemes and assured of appointing an officer for this at the Mandal level. He also said that an officer will be appointed in the CMO for all Dalit empowerment-related matters.

The Chief Minister asked the SC Welfare Minister Koppula Eswar to prepare profiles of Scheduled Caste families. He also directed officials to find out how many study circles can be set up for Dalit students with the centre of excellence. He accepted the suggestion at the all-party meeting that police personnel accused of attacking Dalits should be suspended from the service.

(With IANS Inputs)