By TIOL News Service

NEW DELHI, DEC 01, 2023: UNION Minister of State for Personnel, Public Grievances and Pensions Dr. Jitendra Singh, complimented the Department of Pension and Pensioners Welfare for successful conclusion of the Nation-wide Digital Life Certificate Campaign 2.0 from November 1-30, 2023. Dr. Jitendra Singh said that the DLC Campaign 2.0 was conducted to implement the vision of Prime Minister Modi for Digital Empowerment of Pensioners. He said the Government was deeply committed to Improving Pensioners Welfare and the DLC Campaign 2.0 was an important step for ease of living of Pensioners. The Nation-wide DLC Campaign 2.0 was held in 100 cities at 597 locations from November 1-30, 2023. 1.15 crore DLC's were generated, including 38.47 lac DLC's for Central Government Pensioners, 16.15 lac for State Government Pensioners and 50.91 lac for EPFO Pensioners.

The Department of Pension and Pensioners Welfare in collaboration with Pension Disbursing Banks, Ministries/ Departments, Pensioners' Welfare Associations, UIDAI, MeitY conducted the DLC Campaign 2.0 from November 1-30, 2023 at 597 locations in 100 cities across India. Detailed guidelines defining the roles and responsibilities of all the stakeholders, which includes Ministries/ Departments of Government of India, Pension Disbursing Banks and Pensioners' Associations were issued. 297 Nodal Officers from Pension Disbursing Banks, 44 Pensioner Welfare Associations provided leadership to the DLC Campaign 2.0. Face Authentication Technology was widely used to generate DLC's reducing wait times significantly. The DLC Campaign 2.0 was widely covered in Print and Visual Media by PIB and DD News.

Wide Spread Adoption of Face Authentication Technology

The DLC Campaign was widely adopted by Central Government Pensioners. DLCs were generated for 38 lakhs Central Government Pensioners, of which, the number of face Authenticated DLCs is 9.60 lakhs. DLC submission is an on-going activity as more than 35 lakh defence pensioners can submit life certificate in the month of their retirement. By March, 2024, it is expected that total DLC submission would cross the 50 lakh mark.

DLC's have benefitted Senior Pensioners Significantly

An analysis of the age-wise generation of DLCs reveals that more than 24,000 pensioners above the age of 90 years used digital mode. The leading States for DLC generation are Maharashtra, Uttar Pradesh and West Bengal, having generated 5.07 lakh, 4.55 lakh and 2.65 lakh DLCs respectively. The leading Banks for DLC generation are State Bank of India and Punjab National Bank, the leading Pension Disbursing Banks, with 7.68 and 2.38 DLCs respectively.

Extensive Coverage across the Country

To ensure that the benefit of using digital modes for Life Certificate submission reaches pensioners in all parts of the country, State capitals and major cities were among the 100 cities where camps were held at multiple locations, which included Delhi, Visakhapatnam, Guwahati, Patna, Raipur, Goa, Ahmedabad, Shimla, Ranchi, Bengaluru, Thiruvanthapuram, Bhopal, Mumbai, Bhubaneshwar, Ludhiana, Ajmer, Gangtok, Chennai, Hyderabad, Tripura, Lucknow and Dehradun amongst others. With a view to technologically empowering the pensioners, in addition to generating their DLCs, the process was also explained to them for future use.

In the camps held by Pension Disbursing Banks and Pensioners' Welfare Associations, as well as in their visits to the homes/ hospitals to assist aged/ sick pensioners, several success stories emerged, relating the satisfaction and comfort of the pensioners at the outreach to them.

The Nation-wide DLC Campaign 2.0 is another milestone in the initiatives taken by the Department of Pension and Pensioners' Welfare towards ensuring Ease of Living of pensioners.