CGHS Hospitals will stop cashless treatment from 1st Febraury

The 800 hospitals in the country empanelled under the Central Government Health Scheme will stop cashless transactions from February 1, 2014, because, they claim, the government has not cleared arrears of Rs 600 crore.

The aggrieved hospitals have come together under the umbrella of the Association of Healthcare Providers India and had served notice to the CGHS office in New Delhi on December 13, 2013.

A meeting with the Union health secretary K.N. Desiraju on January 9 yielded no results.

A senior officer of AHPI said, “The amount has been budgeted in the health budget and it must be released. But it is not being done. Hence, the question is, where is it going?”

Since 2010, the hospitals have been complaining of 40 per cent unauthorised deductions in the payments. Now they have come together to put across their point to the government.

AHPI general secretary for AP Govind Hari says, “The problem started in 2002 when they started inviting tenders. In doing so, they reduced the cost of surgeries drastically. Also, orthopaedic treatment costs Rs 3,200 in Karnataka and Rs 10,000 in AP. These errors in terms of determining the cost put the hospitals in a spot.”

A senior member of the APHI said, “We want to quit as it has become more of a burden than a service as the clearance promise of 180 days is hardly followed.”

Additional director, CGHS, Dr Prasad, says, “We have not received any communication from the hospitals.” But senior officers in the Begumpet office of the department say there has been an assessment of the pending amount, and deliberations have started to sort out that matter.

Source : Deccan Chronicle

24th meeting of the Standing Committee of Voluntary Agencies (SCOVA) to be held on 5th February , 2014 in New Delhi.

F. No. 42/2/2014-P&PW(G)

Government of India

Ministry of Personnel, Public Grievances & Pensions

Department of Pension & Pensioners’ Welfare

3rd Floor, Lok Nayak Bhavan,

Khan Market, New Delhi – 110003

Date: 10th Jan 2014

To,
All the Pensioners Associations under present SCOVA

Subject :24th meeting of the Standing Committee of Voluntary Agencies (SCOVA) under the Chairmanship of Honible MOS (PP) to be held on 5th February , 2014 in New Delhi.

- Intimation regarding DATE and TIME.

Sir,

In continuation to this Department’s OM of even no dated 1st Jan,2014 regarding holding of the 24th meeting of Standing Committee of Voluntary Agencies(SCOVA) under the Chairmanship of Hon’ble MOS(PP), the date and time of the meeting is indicated below:

Date:- 5th February, 2014

Time:- 4.00 PM.

2. The Venue of the meeting will soon be intimated. Because of the consideration of space, only one representative may attend the above said meeting.

3. Only one outstation member will be paid TA/DA and local members will be paid conveyance charges in accordance with the rules/instructions. Outstation members will be paid TA/DA as per their last entitlement on retirement. Therefore, members are requested to bring copy of PPO for determining the entitlement of TA/DA claims.

4. This Department looks forward to you participation in the meeting.

Yours faithfully,

Sd/-

(Sujasha Choudhury)

Dy. Secretary (P) 

Source:http://ccis.nic.in/WriteReadData/CircularPortal/D3/D03ppw/SCOVA_130114.pdf

PFRDA proposes partial withdrawal to make NPS attractive

Partial withdrawals are currently not allowed under the NPS and a subscriber has to completely exit from the scheme subject to certain conditions on the utilization of the amount.

New Delhi: To make the national pension system (NPS) more attractive, the Pension Fund Regulatory and Development Authority (PFRDA) has published draft rules that will, if implemented, allow subscribers to withdraw funds partially to meet major expenses such as those related to treatment of certain diseases and education.

Under the proposed guidelines, a subscriber can withdraw as much as 25% of the accumulated funds for marriage of children, purchase of property, higher education and treatment of ailments such as cancer and paralysis.

Partial withdrawals are currently not allowed under the scheme and a subscriber has to completely exit from the scheme subject to certain conditions on the utilization of the amount.

PFRDA administers the NPS for Union and state government employees and the unorganized sector.

The move will make the pension scheme attractive vis-a-vis insurance and the employee provident fund (EPF), where partial withdrawals are possible. The pension scheme for unorganized sector has failed to gain popularity since its launch in May 2009.

The approval of the PFRDA Bill last year by Parliament has paved the way for the restructuring of some of the features of the NPS to make it more attractive. The PFRDA Act, 2013, provides for partial withdrawals, not exceeding 25% of the contribution made by the subscriber.

“This flexibility is positive and will help in increasing the popularity of this scheme,” said Suresh Sadagopan, a certified financial planner at Ladder7 Financial Advisory, a Mumbai-based financial planning firm. “The fact that PFRDA has restricted the withdrawal to 25% of the accumulated amount is also good. Ultimately, it is a scheme meant for retirement savings. If higher withdrawals would have been permitted, the situation would have been a repeat of EPF, where more than 80% of the accounts have less than Rs.20,000 in them.”

The new law also gives the pensions regulator statutory and punitive powers, similar to that of the Securities and Exchange Board of India, the Reserve Bank of India and the Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority.

The government is in the process of revamping the pension fund regulator. It is also shortlisting candidates for the post of the chairman of the pension fund regulator and for the posts of three whole-time members. In November, Yogesh Agarwal, chairman of PFRDA, resigned after being prodded by the finance ministry to quit.

Under the proposed draft guidelines, the subscriber should be in NPS for at least 10 years and regularly contribute to the scheme. Also, the subscriber will only be allowed to withdraw for a maximum of three times and that too with a gap of five years between two withdrawals. However, in case of illnesses, the mandatory gap between withdrawals will not apply.

“We are proposing the above frequency in order to make sure that the subscriber should be left with a decent and considerable accumulated pension wealth at the time of superannuation/age of 60 years enabling him to purchase sustainable annuity,” PFRDA said.

According to the current rules, a subscriber can exit the NPS on retirement or on attaining 60 years. In this case, at least 40% of the accumulated funds have to be mandatorily used to purchase an annuity with the balance paid as a lump sum amount. In case the exit is before retirement or before 60 years of age, at least 80% of the funds have to be used for purchase of an annuity and only the balance is paid as a lump sum.

Courtesy:www.livemint.com