Parliament passed the Divineguma (Amendment) Bill on Thursday.
Much talked about name change of Divineguma to Samurdhiya was a main feature with the amendment.
Social Empowerment and Welfare Minister S.B. Dissanayake said the selection criteria of the Samurdhi benefactors will duly be changed with the amendment and the selection will be equipped with a new software system to increase its efficiency.
“The Samurdhi applicants will have to fill a detailed form of their income, expenses, educational qualifications, family health and many more. The data will then be entered into a system run by a special software which analyse the data and provide results,” Minister Dissanayake explained.
The minister said a special team will be involved in granting Samurdhi. The team will include the Divisional Secretary, Assistant Divisional Secretary, Director (Planning), and the Samurdhi Head Office Manager, he said. Dissanayake explained to parliament the importance of the name Samurdhi as well.
“The name was proposed by Prof. Sunil Ariyaratne. This word ‘Samurdhi’ gives the same meaning in Tamil, Pali, Sanskrit, and Hindi,” the minister said.
He said the Samurdhi took examples from the Janasawiya of the late President, Premadasa, India’s Sewa programme, Bangladesh’s Gramin Project, South Korea’s Samuel Don project among others.
“The Samurdhi was not properly implemented by the previous government. This government will pay attention to the complaint that the UNP supporters were deprived of Samurdhi due to political reasons,” he said
JVP MP Dr. Nalinda Jayatissa said the previous government spent over Rs. 50 million to change the project name from ‘Samurdhi’ to ‘Divineguma’.
“So, is the government planing to spend Rs. 75 million to change the name back to ‘Samurdhi’?” Jayatissa questioned.
The MP said 8,000 Samurdhi families were not received the death concessionaires that they were entitled for in 2013, 2014, and 2015.
The Leader of the House Lakshman Kiriella said the government had paid all the death concessionaires in the year 2015/16.
The MP said the previous regime did not paid the transport allowances that Samurdhi officers were entitled for.
“To fully pay the transport allowance, they should have paid Rs. 209 millions. However, only Rs. 49 million were paid,” he said.
The MP queried why the Samurdhi Social Security Fund is not audited by the Auditor General.
Minister S.B. Dissanayake said the requests were made several times, but it did not become a reality since the funding is not of the government.
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