The Committee on Women Empowerment of the State Assembly on Thursday took up the issue of hardships faced by many people including women who are the head of the family in the PDS ration card, and asked officers of the state government to address the problems related to Aadhar.
The Committee on Women Empowerment is headed by Congress MLA, Ampareen Lyngdoh, and the committee flagged the issue during a meeting with officials of the government including from the labour department.
The Committee asked the State government to also write to the Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) to address the delay in issuing of Aadhaar cards.
Lyngdoh said that the committee found that the Aadhaar enrolment was slow and many women and other applicants were standing in long queues in order to get the Aadhaar cards since the government has linked various schemes with Aadhar.
“The government has made Aadhar mandatory where no beneficiary can avail benefits without linking their Aadhar number with ration card for availing rice and other PDS items, besides PMAY scheme, students’ scholarship and other schemes,” the MLA said.
Overall, Lyngdoh said that the officers informed the committee that only 33 per cent of the population in the state have Aadhar cards.
The committee also reviewed the unemployment scenario in the state including problems faced by returnees who had returned to the state from various states of the country due to the COVID-19 pandemic, are now living without job.
The committee sought to know the plan of the government to help such people as well as labourers who have not received the money under the Chief Minister’s Relief Against Wage Loss Scheme (CRAWL) and the need to register those construction workers under the “Building and Other Construction Workers (Regulation of Employment and Conditions of Service) Act, 1996.”