BISP beneficiaries to get relief on electricity, gas bills.

ISLAMABAD, November 06, 2009 (Balochistan Times): Benazir Income Support Programme (BISP) beneficiaries would get 200 units of free electricity and natural gas. Chairperson BISP, Farzana Raja told that work has been initiated to facilitate tens of thousands of poor families who are registered under the programme. Initially 2.2 million registered families will get the benefit and more families will be included after completion of poverty survey and the network will be expanded to around five million families. BISP will hold meetings with Ministry of Water and Power and Ministry of Petroleum to devise a mechanism to benefit as many poor families as possible, she said. After finalizing all the procedure, the summary will be sent to the Prime Minister for approval, she added. The pilot project of poverty survey will be completed by the end of this month and it will identify more deserving families and the beneficiaries would reach up to five million vulnerable families, she informed. The door to door poverty score card survey is being conducted in 16 poorest districts of the country. Every citizen of the country can get benefit from the programme as it is initiated by taking government, opposition and all political parties on board, she added. These families will further get the accident and health insurance from the programme and also technical and vocational training will be imparted to make them self-reliant, Farzana added. Moreover, the Benazir smart card will be issued in those districts where the poverty survey will have been completed, she informed. Talking about the targets achieved by the programme, she said that the BISP has reached to most of the families in very short time with the purpose to empower women and alleviate poverty from the country while a similar programme initiated in Mexico took eight years to get required results, she added. Answering a question, she said the payment for regular programme was stopped due the verification process of Internally Displaced Persons. However, those who did not get money will soon receive the amount at their given addresses, Farzana added. She said that BISP being a large scale poverty alleviation programme is appreciated for its transparent procedure. Terming her recent visit to US a successful, she said, United States would provide financial assistance worth US$ 175 million to BISP annually under Kerry Luger Bill to alleviate poverty from the country and provide a social safety network. She said that UN Secretary General Ban Ki Moon has termed BISP a model programme and emphasized for sharing the experiences with other countries to benefit people living below poverty line across the world besides South Asia. Replying to another question, Farzana said, to counter corruption in disbursement of funds, the government is doing its best to avoid any mishandling of money and strict action has taken against the workers of 12 post offices who were involved in mismanagement.

(THROUGH ASIA PULSE)