Parents care Act brought into force in 19 states
By chennaivision at 13 January, 2009, 10:55 am
New Delhi, Jan 12 As many 19 states and six union territoris had so far notified the ‘Maintenance and Welfare of Parents and Senior Citizens Act, 2007, Minister of Social Justice and Empowerment Meira Kumar said here today.
Speaking after conferring the Vayoshreshtha Samman on eminent senior citizens, Ms Kumar said the main aim of the legislation was to create an enabling mechanism to make the claim for maintenance simpler, speedier and cheaper.
The maintenance provisions for parents had not been subjected to the age criteria of senior citizens, as parents who technically might not be senior citizens but were indigent or medically unfit or widowed, had been brought under the safety net of the law, said the Minister.
”The Act makes it imperative for their children or ward to look after and provide maintenance to them. Application to the Tribunal can be made by the parents or any persons authorized by them in this behalf’, said Ms Kumar.
As the provisions of the Act were to be implemented by the states, they were given the authority to frame rules, and so far 19 States and 6 union Territories had notified the Act and brought it into force, she said.
Ms Kumar said since safeguarding the rights of the elderly had been an issue of paramount concern, the Ministry had taken a number of pro-active steps in this direction.
She said the grant-in-aid scheme had been revised with effect from 1st April 2008 and was now called the ‘Integrated Programme for Older Persons’ where 16 innovative projects would now be funded.
While the amount of grant being given to NGOs for supporting old age homes, day care centres and mobile Medicare units had almost been doubled, a number of innovative projects had been included in the Scheme, which include running of day care centres for Alzheimer’s/Dementia Patients, help-lines and counselling centres for older persons, disability and hearing aids for older persons, physiotherapy clinics, sensitizing programmes for children particularly in schools and colleges and regional resource and training centres, she said.
The Vayoshreshtha Samman were conferred as part of the Celebration of International Day of Older Persons. The awardees in different categories are: Nightingales Medical Trust (Institutional Service), Varishtha Nagarik Sanghathan (Institutional Service), Pushpa Ranjan Chatterjee (Centenarian), Sonaullah Panzoo (courage and Bravery), Shakuntala Devi( Courage and Bravery), B.G. Deshmukh(Lifetime Achievement ), Nirmala Narula (Lifetime Achievement), Saroja Vaidyanathan(Creative Art), Thirurangadi Block Panchayat (Best Panchayat), Sumant Misra (Sports Person) and Kochuparambil Mylen Sarada(Best Mother) UNI
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