Woman forced to walk barefoot with broken chair to collect pension; FM Sitharaman hauls up SBI

A septuagenarian woman was forced to walk barefoot for kilometres on end for collecting her pension. The frail woman can be seen walking with the support of a broken chair in the scorching heat. Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman, sharing the video,  hauled up State Bank of India (SBI) for the plight of the woman. 

The elderly woman in the video has been identified as Surya Harijan. Harijan’s older son is a migrant laborer in another state. She stays with her younger son who grazes other people’s cattle. The family does not have any land and lives in a hut.

Finance Minister Sitharaman shared the video on Twitter and wrote: “Can see the manager of the State Bank of India (SBI) responding but yet wish Department of Financial Services (DFS) and the SBI to take cognisance of this and act humanely. Are they no bank Mitra?” 

This incident took place on April 17 in Odisha’s Nabrangpur district. 

The SBI responded to Sitharaman’s tweet and said her pension will be delivered at her doorstep from the next month. The public lender added the woman will also be given a wheelchair. 

The lady was told her thumb is not matching with records and had to return back to home. The SBI manager claimed she is facing trouble because of her “broken fingers”. 

The SBI manager of the Jharigaon branch was quoted as saying by news agency ANI: “Her fingers are broken, so she is facing trouble withdrawing money. She has been given Rs 3,000 manually from the bank. We will resolve the problem soon.”

Despite various government schemes in place to help the needy, Harijan has not been able to avail them due to various reasons. She was previously provided with pension money in hand. Since the change in system for pension transfer, the money is being transferred online to her account.

(With agency inputs)

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