Lens On Empowering Women, Food Security, Health Insurance, Housing

Guwahati: With major focus of the state budget for 2023-24 on fight against poverty in order to push for an inclusive and holistic development, finance minister Ajanta Neog proposed the country’s biggest health insurance scheme which will enable 57 lakh families of the state to avail Rs 5 lakh worth of cashless treatment.Neog has proposed allocation of over Rs 4,700 crore for a four-pronged strategy to mitigate poverty under “Daridrata Nivaran” (poverty alleviation) — empowering women with Orunodoi, ensuring health insurance through Mukhya Mantri Ayushman Asom Yojana, ensuring food security and affordable housing through Mukhya Mantri Awas Yojana.“The Mukhya Mantri Ayushman Asom Yojana, which is the health insurance scheme, is a significant step towards achieving our long-term goal of ensuring that every citizen has access to affordable and quality healthcare,” she said.Neog said Pradhan Mantri Jan Aarogya Yojana is being implemented in Assam, under which 30 lakh families are entitled but following the advice of the central government, “we have migrated to the National Food Security Act (NFSA) database”.“In order to give 100% coverage to these NFSA beneficiaries, our government is launching Mukhya Mantri Ayushman Asom Yojana. It will enable 27 lakh additional families of the state to avail Rs 5 lakh worth of cashless treatment, making it the biggest health insurance scheme in the country,” she said.She said while the Atal Amrit Abhiyan was giving health assurance to individuals, Mukhya Mantri Ayushman Asom will cover the entire family. To avoid duplicity, Atal Amrit Abhiyan will be discontinued. “A cashless card will be given to each eligible family to avail free treatment. Till these cards are made available to the beneficiaries, ration cards will be accepted in the empanelled hospitals to avail the benefits,” she said, allocating Rs 135 crore for the scheme.“The lion’s share of the poverty alleviation allocation amounting to Rs 3,420 crore for this scheme has been allocated for Orunodoi, which has emerged as one of our prime women-centric flagship programmes. A committed transfer of Rs 1,250 to more than 17 lakh beneficiaries has been relaunched with addition of 10 lakh more beneficiaries, which will take the total coverage to 27.5 lakh and each beneficiary will get an enhanced assistance of Rs 1,400 per month,” she said.She proposed incorporating two other women-centric schemes, “Indira Miri Universal Widow Pension Scheme” and “Deen Dayal Dibyangjan Pension Achoni” into Orunodoi. These beneficiaries who are receiving Rs 300 and Rs 1,000 respectively, will get Rs 1,250 from 2023-24 onwards.The minister said to ensure food security, Assam has already onboarded One Nation One Ration Card (ONORC) scheme since June, 2022, and a decision has been taken to select 40 lakh new beneficiaries under NFSA and new ration cards will be issued accordingly. Neog has earmarked Rs 404.94 crore for this.Neog also proposed the launch of Mukhya Mantri Awas Yojana, modelled on Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana (PMAY) with assistance of similar amount to provide affordable housing to the economically weaker sections of society and the lower-income groups. “More than 20 lakh houses have already been geo-tagged under PMAY, out of which 15.5 lakh households are eligible. We have received the sanction for 3.3 lakh houses till now from the Centre and we are expecting this number to increase,” she said.