Telangana launches drive to rehabilitate beggars

HYDERABAD: The Telangana government, on Saturday, announced the launch of an action plan to rehabilitate all beggars in Hyderabad as part of a national campaign rolled out by the Union ministry of social justice and empowerment. The first phase of the drive will be simultaneously flagged off in 10 cities including Mumbai, New Delhi, Kolkata, Bengaluru among others, said officials.
As a first step towards implementing the National Campaign for Comprehensive Rehabilitation of People involved in Begging, the Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation (GHMC) will identify the beggars, create a database and subsequently roll out a rehabilitation plan. As per rough estimates, the city has around 4,000 to 5,000 beggars.

“The Government of India (GOI) will provide Rs 10 crore for the project,” said R Subramanyam, secretary, department of social justice and empowerment while urging the officials and stakeholders to prepare plan that can been implemented from April.
A similar rehabilitation programme for beggars was taken up in 2017, ahead Ivanka Trump’s visit to Hyderabad for the Global Economic Summit. During the initiative, GHMC and police officials had randomly picked up beggars from the city and shifted them to GHMC shelter homes. Sources said they were released after two or three months.
“In 2017, around 1,000 beggars were shifted to my ashram. We counselled them for two months and sent them back. Beggars were also shifted to Anand Ashram in Chanchalguda Central Prison but it did not yield any result,” said Gattu Shankar, founder of the Amma Nanna Anada Ashramam, Choutuppal.
This year GHMC claims that project will ensure sustainable livelihood to every beggar identified as part of the drive. Stakeholders in the project claimed that action plan will include skill development programmes for these people. “Types of skill development programmes that will be taken up by civic body can only be rolled out based on the needs of beggars and their health condition. Survey and identification of beggars, setting up of shelter homes, health care facilities, education to children and skill development training will be taken up,” said a GHMC official.
Reiterating this, Radhika Chakravarthy, joint secretary, department of social justice & empowerment said: “Specialised activities shall be taken up for physically handicapped, senior citizens, women and children involved in begging,” while MAUD principal secretary Arvind Kumar urged various stakeholders to suggest viable economic options to be taken up for uplifting the persons involved in begging.