Dependents of doctors got just over 20% of the total money distributed under the Pradhan Mantri Garib Kalyan Package (PMGKP) insurance scheme for health workers who died fighting COVID-19 in the country.
The scheme ensures an insurance coverage of ₹50 lakh each. According to a Right to Information Act (RTI) reply from New India Assurance Company Ltd. on September 16, the “total number of beneficiaries under PMGKP insurance scheme” as on August 31 was 1,962 and the amount disbursed was ₹981 crore. Among them, the number of doctors whose beneficiaries got compensation was 424 and the amount disbursed was ₹212 crore.
Asked about Statewise data, the company said that “neither such information is available nor required to be maintained by this Public Authority, hence cannot be provided”. This information was made available by the Union Ministry of Health and Family Welfare.
On September 8, the company said in another RTI reply that 974 people had been given compensation to the tune of ₹487 crore. Among them, 206 were doctors and the amount distributed was ₹103 crore. On August 5, the company said that 445 beneficiaries had been “compensated for the doctors” who died due to COVID-19 under the scheme and ₹222.5 crore had been disbursed as compensation.
“Just over 21.5% of the money disbursed under the PMGKP has been given to doctors. As per the data collected by the Indian Medical Association, over 1,800 doctors have died in the line of COVID-19 duty. This means over 75% of doctors who succumbed to the infection have not benefited from the scheme because a majority of them were not working in COVID-designated hospitals,” K.V. Babu, Kannur-based ophthalmologist and RTI activist, who managed to get these documents, told The Hindu on Sunday.
He said a special leave petition filed in the Supreme Court assumed importance in this context. It was initially filed before the High Court of Bombay by Kiran Bhaskar Surgade, whose spouse, Bhaskar Surgade, a doctor who ran his own clinic, died on June 10, 2020.
Dr. Surgade was asked by the authorities to keep the clinic open during the pandemic. But his dependents were reportedly denied the insurance cover. The court while allowing the petition said that the issue had been raised as a matter of significant public importance since it had a bearing on the assured cover of insurance, which was sought to be provided by the Union government to health professionals who had served the nation in the course of the pandemic.
