Daily Times

Special Assistant to Prime Minister (SAPM) on Poverty Alleviation and Social Protection Dr Sania Nishtar said on Wednesday that national prosperity survey would be completed by June 30 this year.

Talking to the media here at DC office, she said that 70 per cent of socioeconomic and poverty survey including 54 percent in Punjab had been completed under the Ehsaas Programme.

She said that Ehsaas Kifalat programme was providing financial assistance to the deserving people of the society, in which, special persons could also join the programme by making special cards from NADRA.

Ruling out any discrimination in the data collection, she said the survey was being carried out irrespective of one’s caste, ethnic, religious or any political affiliation.

She mentioned that financial assistance to the deserving families through Ehsaas Kafalat Programme, primary school education stipends for students, Ehsaas Amdan, and interest-free loans etc was being provided on the basis of survey.

SAPM Dr Sania said that payments had been started to 7 million deserving families under Ehsaas Kafalat Programme while SMS were being sent to 700,000 newly registered families after the survey. She said the PTI government under the leadership of Prime Minister Imran Khan was taking practical steps to raise the living standard of people. She called upon the media to play their role in creating awareness about the survey among the general public.

Director General Benazir Income Support programme Punjab Rana Shahid, Deputy Commissioner Sargodha Naila Baqir and Director Benazir Income Support Programme Sargodha Muqaddas Naveed Cheema were also present on the occasion.

Meanwhile, Dr Sania Nishtar during a news conference formally opened Ehsaas survey in the Sargodha district. This was the fifth news briefing by Dr. Nishtar in a month with the accelerated execution of the Ehsaas survey post-COVID-19, said a message received here from Sargodha.

“The new Ehsaas survey has begun in all seven Tehsils of Sargodha while it is 70 percent ready nationwide and would realize by June 2021 to enrol seven million households living in extreme poverty”, she said.

” Ehsaas has expedited the digitally oriented survey activities in the entire country to ensure the timely completion,”, she said.

As across Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Gilgit Baltistan, Azad Jammu and Kashmir and several other areas, Ehsaas survey in Sargodha is being rolled out through an approach where local teachers will collect data within their designated enumeration areas.

The survey has been technically administered by Ehsaas in collaboration with the School Education Department of Punjab so that household data can be collected in a fully transparent manner.

So far, 717 teachers have been technically trained as enumerators to collect data from door to door in all Tehsils of Sargodha. According to the 2017 census, there are more than 600,000 households in Sargodha and to assist with the survey, 4,977 enumeration areas have been defined accordingly.

The survey teams are collecting household data on the doorstep through android applications. Households are being enrolled or excluded in the Ehsaas Kafaalat based on information gathered in the survey.

With the readiness of survey in each district, eligible households are being enrolled and provided Kafaalat stipends phase-wise. Through 8171 SMS service, eligibility messages are also being sent out to the newly enrolled households asking them to collect their Kafaalat payment from the biometric ATMs, designated retail outlets and payment sites of the partner banks- HBL (Punjab, Sindh, Balochistan, Islamabad) and Bank Alfalah (KP, GB, AJK). Further, Dr Nishtar urged district administration, government teachers and local media to create awareness about the survey among the public, stating that it is a free-of-cost and voluntary process and therefore, the people cooperate with the survey team by sharing correct and accurate information.

Executed by the government, the Ehsaas survey and Ehsaas Kafaalat enrolments are being undertaken on non-political basis so that deserving households can reap maximum benefits of this programme.

This survey will also enable the government in effective targeting of the most vulnerable households for Ehsaas Kafaalat, Waseela-e-Taleem Digital, Ehsaas Nashonuma as well as several others. Later, Dr. Nishtar visited the site of the survey in adjoining area of Sargodha to meet beneficiaries and enquired about the survey process and performance of enumerators.