Irregularities in Freedom Fighters Pension Scheme

Press Information Bureau 

Government of India

Ministry of Home Affairs 

10-December-2013 16:50 IST

The data of the freedom fighters and their eligible dependents drawing Central Samman pension, provided by various Public Sector banks, was scrutinized by Internal Audit Wing of Ministry of Home Affairs. The Audit made observations regarding discrepancies found by them in disbursal of pension to the freedom fighters/dependents. The data indicated a number of identical names of the pensioners/eligible dependents. Since complete details such as father’s/husband’s names, address, correct Pension Payment Order numbers in many cases had not been provided by the banks, they were advised to reconcile and update the data after verification. Some of the banks have reported discrepancies in disbursal of pension to the freedom fighters/dependents in a few cases which include disbursal of dependent family pension to the pensioners’ widows who themselves are Central Samman Pensioners; disbursal of full family pension to each of two widows of a deceased freedom fighter; crediting of pension to the accounts of the central samman pensioners ever after their death; and disbursal of State Pension from Central Government account. The concerned banks have been advised to disburse family pension to eligible dependents of Central samman pensioners in accordance with the instructions issued in this regard and to recover excess payments from the concerned pensioners/dependents. The banks who have disbursed State freedom fighters pension from the Central Government account have been advised to refund such payments along with penal interest. The Public Sector banks have taken steps to rectify the discrepancies in disbursal of Central samman pension. As per the information furnished by the banks, approximately 76.00 lakh has been recovered by them and remitted to Central Government account. RBI and office of C&AG have been requested to conduct comprehensive audit of disbursal of pension by the banks and State Treasuries respectively. 

This was stated by Shri R.P.N.Singh, Minister of State in the Ministry of Home Affairs in written reply to a question by Smt Supriya Sule, Dr. Sanjeev Ganesh Naik, Shri Sanjay Dina Patil, Shri Eknath M. Gaikwad, Shri Subhash Bapurao Wankhede, Shri B.B. Patil, Shri Anand Prakash Paranjpe and Shri A. Venkata Rami Reddy in Lok Sabha today. 

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