Chandigarh, August 1

Women and Child Development Minister Aruna Chaudhary on Sunday said disbursement of doubled social security pension to the tune of Rs 1,500 had been started from August 1 with Rs 4,000 crore budgetary allocation.

The minister said, “Total 26,21,201 eligible beneficiaries of the state will be benefitted with the increased pension.”

A budgetary outlay of Rs 4,000 crore has been allocated for 2021-22 in view of the doubled monthly pension, which signifies an increase of 72 per cent from 2020-21 budgetary expenditure of Rs 2,320 crore. Meanwhile, pension amounting to Rs 2,089 crore was disbursed in 2019-20 and Rs 2,277 crore in 2020-21, which was three times more the amount of Rs 747 crore provided as pension by the SAD-BJP government, she added. — TNS