PM Imran’s corona relief

The PM on Thursday launched the Rs144 billion Ehsaas Relief Programme meant to cater to 120 million needy people who have been hit hard by the coronavirus lockdown across the country. Under the initiative, Rs50 billion have been given to banks for distribution of a four-month stipend, totalling Rs12,000, among some 40 million people in the first phase. Broadly speaking, the initiative is a good one, given the existing pressures on the economy. While there may be some criticism of the amount, it ties into a broader relief package, and any critique should be of the total package.

Where critique of the handout formula is valid is how it was done, with reports of at least one death and more than 20 injuries in Multan alone caused by a stampede during cash collection. Social distancing rules were supposedly enforced, but then ignored when millions of people showed up at 17,000 bank branches and 3,000 ‘camp sites’ to collect their money. While the government said they were only calling about 20% of recipients in any given area on any day to collect their money, even that works out to around 400 people per site per day on average, and many locations lack even that much capacity.

Given the increasing prevalence of mobile wallet services, the government would have been well advised to have made them available as collection options as well, if only to reduce crowd sizes at physical distribution points. Mobile wallets would also help cut down on demands for bribes, which were also reported, and shifty ‘agents’ collecting their fees from recipients. It’s a pity that a government pushing so hard on digitising Pakistan completely ignored the digital option in front of them. Meanwhile, the government has also announced a Rs2.5 billion subsidy covering 19 items at Utility Stores, and said the amount could be tripled, if necessary. This is on top of the prime minister’s relief package, under which Rs10 billion had been allocated to subsidise various items.

The coronavirus has unfortunately made some tough times even tougher, and we must again give credit to the government for trying to soften the blow, both on the poorest citizens with the stipend, and on the middle class with the Utility Store subsidy.

Published in The Express Tribune, April 12^th, 2020.

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