3,049 COVID orphans identified for aid: Govt to Parliament

New Delhi: The Centre has identified 3,049 Covid orphans across the country for support under the PM-CARES for Children Scheme, the Ministry of Women and Child Development said on Friday. In a written reply to Lok Sabha, WCD Minister Smriti Irani said her ministry authenticated 3,049 of the 5,491 applications received for support under the scheme, tailored to support children who have lost both their parents, a surviving parent, legal guardian or adoptive parents to Covid-19.

Another 483 applications are pending approval and are being verified, she said.

The PM-CARES for Children scheme provides support for education and health and will create a corpus of Rs10 lakh for each child when they reach 18 years of age. This corpus will be used to give a monthly financial support or stipend from 18 years of age, for the next five years to take care of the beneficiary’s personal requirements during higher education and on reaching the age of 23 years, they will get the corpus amount as a lump-sum.

Under the Child Protection Services (CPS) scheme which the Ministry is implementing, Irani said support is provided to states and Union Territories for delivering services to children in need. Child Care Institutions (CCIs) established under the CPS scheme support age-appropriate education, access to vocational training, recreation, health care, counselling etc. and equally cover rural and urban children.

As per the scheme guidelines, a sponsorship of Rs 2,000 per child per month is available for non-institutional care of children in need of care and protection and there is provision for a maintenance grant of Rs 2,160 per child per month for those living in CCIs.