Age mismatch leads to huge pension pilferage suspicion in Karnataka

Bengaluru: Karnataka might have lost thousands of crores over several years as persons falsely claimed they were 60 years of age to receive social security pensions meant for senior citizens, authorities have found during an internal audit. 

There are about 26 lakh beneficiaries of the old age pension whose age, as per their Aadhaar, are below 60 years, making them ineligible for the benefit, according to Revenue Minister Krishna Byre Gowda. 

“They’ve taken the benefit for the last 5-8 years. Of the 26 lakh, even if 10 lakh are truly ineligible, then we’re looking at Rs 1,000-1,500 crore of money that has been paid to them every year,” Gowda told DH. 

Gowda held a meeting with senior officials, including his principal secretary Munish Moudgil, on tackling this problem. “Wilful fraud on the public exchequer can’t be pardoned,” the minister said. 

The total number of beneficiaries under various state-funded pension schemes is 82.57 lakh on whom the government spends Rs 10,500 crore annually.

Age-related discrepancies have been found with beneficiaries of the old age pension scheme (they get Rs 400-1,000 per month by the state government) and Sandhya Suraksha (Rs 1,000 for persons aged above 65). 

Gowda said it took his department nearly a year to obtain actionable data. “We matched our pensions database with Aadhaar. That’s how this age mismatch came up,” Gowda said. “We found that the Aadhaar age of many beneficiaries is significantly lower than 60 years. The difference is 5-15 years. They’ve declared their age in Aadhaar as 45, but are claiming to be 60+ and receiving pensions,” he said. 

The data will be given to village administrative officers (VAO) to crosscheck on the ground in a traceable manner, the minister said. 

According to sources, beneficiaries will be asked to produce their birth or marriage certificate. If these documents are not available, beneficiaries will be asked for the birth or school admission certificate of their children. “Say, if the child is 10 years old, it’s unlikely that the beneficiary will be 60,” a source said.

The audit also found discrepancies involving monthly pensions for disabled beneficiaries (Rs 800-2,000). “We have cases where beneficiaries, who look physically fit, have claimed 75% disability based on certificates by doctors. Such cases are there in Raichur, Vijayapura and Belagavi,” an official said. 

Sources said ground-level officials may be hand-in-glove with beneficiaries for approving pension applications.