Welfare measures also initiated for NHM, divyang employees
GUWAHATI: Children of employees of the two non-operational Hindustan Paper Corporation Ltd (HPCL) mills in Assam will now be able to avail of one-time financial aid under a special scholarship scheme announced on Thursday.
Under the scheme, students pursuing medical, engineering or other similar professional course would get financial aid of Rs 1 lakh each while post-graduate and research scholars will be provided Rs 75,000 each.
“Students pursuing graduation or polytechnic diploma courses can avail a one-time financial assistance of Rs 50000, those pursuing higher secondary or similar courses will get Rs 25000 while school students from primary level to Class X will get Rs 10000 under the scheme,” Assam finance minister, Himanta Biswa Sarma informed reporters here on Thursday.
According to preliminary assessment, the state government will invest about Rs 5 crore in making the scheme operational.
It may be noted that the National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT) had recently directed occupants of the residential quarters of the HPCL mills to vacate the quarters by January 31, 2020. The NCLT order was issued under Section 34 (3) of the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code, 2016 following a hearing on November 25, 2019.
Work at Cachar Paper Mill in Panchgram has been suspended since October 20, 2015, while operations at Nagaon Paper Mill at Jagiroad came to a halt on March 13, 2017.
“There has been uncertainty among the workers of the two mills since the move to close down operations of the two mills. However, we feel that this scholarship scheme will fulfill the education needs of the children of the mill employees for a year. Thereafter, we will review the situation,” Sarma said.
The beneficiaries can send their applications to a link in the web portal of the state finance department from January 14 to 20, 2020 and after a 10-day review thereafter by the concerned deputy commissioners, the money would be credited to their respective bank accounts through direct benefit transfer mode in the first week of February.
He further announced the notification of a medical reimbursement (family floater) scheme for National Health Mission employees in the state under which an employee can avail of reimbursement against medical bills of their family (including parents) up to Rs 5lakh per year.
“The scheme will be effective from January 1, 2020 even as we have issued the notification today. About 50,000 employees would be benefitted. There will be a facility for advance payments for specific ailments under the scheme as well,” Sarma said.
The minister further said that in the coming months, the medical scheme would cover about 1 lakh employees under Sarva Sikhsha Abhiyan and state directorate of secondary education as well.
“Besides, there will be scheme for divyang (physically challenged) state government employees under which the government would bear 4 per cent of the interest against bank loans taken to procure the vehicles (which may also be customised),” the minister said.