BISP recipients

The previous government, led by the PTI, had struck off 820,165 names from the database of beneficiaries of the Benazir Income Support Programme. The present government claims that these names were removed due to political considerations and it will restore them on the BISP database after thorough scrutiny. Those removed from the database included 140,00 government employees who themselves or their spouses were alleged to be in government service. Both sides seem to be justified considering the prevalence of cheating and fraud in all societies. Another incontrovertible fact is that political parties, particularly in the Third World, tend to misuse public funds for narrow ends. PM Shehbaz Sharif has asked Minister for Poverty Alleviation Shazia Marri to devise a procedure to review the cases of those seeking re-inclusion in the BISP database.

Justifying the removal of more than eight million names as BISP beneficiaries, the PTI government had claimed that these people had got themselves registered fraudulently, and many of them were dropped from the welfare programme because overtime their socio-economic status had improved. Financial help to the deserving is provided for a limited period the world over. Nowhere is it an endless source of income. The then minister in charge of the BISP had also claimed that many government employees serving in higher grades themselves or their spouses too received the BISP cash hand-out, so their names were removed from the database. If the claim of the PTI government was true, it is both shocking and ludicrous.

Minster Shazia Marri has said that she will visit all zonal offices of the BISP across the country to ascertain how many BISP beneficiaries were declared undeserving on political grounds, and that she will ensure that they continue to get the cash hand-out under the social security programme. Not only should the government resume the BISP assistance to those removed unjustifiably from the BISP database but put in place a foolproof system to weed out fake claimants of welfare assistance.

Published in The Express Tribune, April 29^th, 2022.

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