Sparsh: if it aint broken, don't mend it.

 

A defence civilian pensioner came to Bangalore from Faridabad in 2019 to live with his daughter after his wife's death. He is in his mid nineties now. His pension account was (and still is) in a Government bank in Faridabad.

Unfortunately, he fell down and broke his hip bone. He recovered, but couldn't travel. In November, every year thereafter, his fight and struggle to let the Government know that he was alive, started. Folks earning government pension have to submit and drivel before the authorities each November that they are alive. Else, their pension would be stopped. Here is a man in his mid nineties who was told to do all sorts of things - from getting an android smartphone to creating an email account - a person who doesn't even know what in the (virtual) world the Internet is!

Then the pandemic happened.

He was forced to visit banks in Bangalore in the raging pandemic trying to request the banks to allow him to let the Government know that he was alive. Of course, he could go around -with pain and anxiety, of course- because of the support of his daughter. There must surely be others who have to go around without anyone's support.

Somehow, in November 2019, 2020 and 2021 he was able to convince the Government that he was alive.

Then, Sparsh happened.

Government, in its unlimited wisdom, migrated pensions paid from Defence Estimates to a wonder drug called Sparsh. It broke a golden rule inherited from our forefathers: if it aint broken, don't mend it.

The wonder website 'Sparsh' was created by the Government, that purporedly would save megabucks in pension disbursement to defence pensioners. As an aside: why no other groups of pensioners were done this favour, we don't know.

Sparsh means touch. But this touch (or slight) has brought grief to many an elderly defence pensioner. Come November, every day they get a message on their phones that they had better let the Government know through Sparsh that they are alive, else their pension will be stopped. Most don't even understand what the message means, let alone taking action on the message.

After many rounds of the banks, and after many solicited and unsolicited advices from tech savvy folks, this dear old man in his mid nineties, still hasn't been able to convince the Government that he is alive - and deserves a pension.

Next, perhaps an order will come from the Government that, through Sparsh, a pensioner will have to upload a video that has a clip of the pensioner dancing like John Travolta's dancing in Saturday Night Fever's Stayin' Alive - in order that the defence pensioner's pension be joyfully continued.

PS: Since we are so damn tech savvy, why not link stopping of pension with the Death Certificate as opposed to asking for Life Certificate every year? Since, Birth and Death certificates are digitised and stored, this would be low hanging fruits for the mandarins of IT, would it not?