Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M K Stalin on Friday launched the extension of Rs 1,000 monthly assistance scheme for women to over seven lakh more beneficiaries.
Marking the inclusion of 7.35 lakh new beneficiaries in the scheme, Stalin, in a government event here, gave away bank debit cards to six beneficiaries.
The Chief Minister said: "This is such a massive scheme which has more than one crore beneficiaries and there is no room for even a small complaint. That is the biggest victory of this scheme, which is a model for the whole country."
Stalin said the government is very careful to ensure that no eligible woman is left out of the scheme and work to enroll all eligible persons will continue.
The DMK regime's flagship "Kalaignar Magalir Urimai Thittam," (Kalaignar Scheme for Right of Women) was rolled out on September 15, 2023.
It will now have nearly 1.14 crore (1,13,84,300) beneficiaries with the addition of new beneficiaries.
The government had received 1.63 crore applications seeking the assistance and of them 1.06 crore (about 1,06,50,000) were found to be eligible. They were enrolled under the assistance scheme at the time of the launch.
The Rs 1,000 assistance is paid to beneficiaries through Direct Benefit Transfer.
A basic income programme, it is named after former chief minister M Karunanidhi and the state government christened the assistance the "right" of women.
DMK patriarch Karunanidhi (1924-2018) is popularly known as Kalaignar, which means an artist. The government had said the scheme had a Rs 7,000 crore allocation for this year.
Ministers including Duraimurugan (Water Resources) and Udhayanidhi Stalin (Youth Welfare and Sports), Chief Secretary Shiv Das Meena and senior officials took part.
