All this while Chief Minister V D Sastheesan has tried his best to evade the question about the fate of Sthree Suraksha Pension, the monthly ₹1,000 assistance the LDF government had announced in its last Budget. 

There was no mention of it in Satheesan's 'Revised Budget Speech' on January 19. And on June 21, when he was asked about the various social welfare measures of the previous government in the Assembly, the Chief Minister did not include 'Sthree Suraksha Pension' in the list.

The Opposition LDF, therefore, moved an adjournment motion in the Assembly on Monday to force the Chief Minister to make a clear policy declaration on 'Sthree Suraksha Pension'. The CM was still not ready to make a statement that would shut all speculation on the subject. Neither did he say that the scheme would be persisted with, nor did he say it would be dumped. Nonetheless, his lack of enthusiasm for the LDF scheme was evident.

Satheesan called the pension scheme as one of those schemes the LDF government had announced "on its way out". He said the pension scheme was inaugurated on February 11, just before the Assembly elections. "The assistance for February and March was disbursed on March 16, the day the election notification was issued," the CM said. In March, Sthree Suraksha Pension for two months (February and March) was transferred to the accounts of over 16 lakh women, and after this, the scheme has been put on hold.  

The thrust of the Chief Minister's argument was that the pension scheme was rolled out in haste. "To begin with, it was said the scheme would benefit 31.34 lakh women, but then they revised the beneficiary pool to 16.4 lakh. The beneficiary list was drawn up without a proper assessment. No field visits were carried out. There are innumerable complaints about the list," Satheesan said. 

He said the beneficiaries were handpicked by the CPM's local and area committees. "The beneficiaries were chosen without even checking whether they had other social welfare pensions," the CM said. 

This does not mean that the pension scheme has been scrapped. "It has not been decided that this scheme is unwanted. We have allocated ₹1,770 crore in the Budget," the CM said, and added: "However, there is no question of disbursing the pension without subjecting the beneficiary list to a thorough check." K N Balagopal, in his last Budget Speech on January 29 this year, had allocated ₹3,720 crore for the pension scheme. Less than half this amount has now been retained for the pension scheme by Satheesan.  

The Sthree Suraksha Pension was limited to women and transgender persons between 30 and 60 years of age. The beneficiaries will be chosen only from those possessing Antyodaya Anna Yojana (AAY)  yellow cards meant for the poorest of the poor, and priority household (PHH) pink ration cards. Also ineligible are those getting other social welfare assistance like widow pension, unmarried pension, handicap pension, family pension or welfare board pensions and EPF pension.

Satheesan's argument was that such conditions were not applied when the beneficiary list was drawn up.

Opposition leader Pinarayi Vijayan, however, said that the government already had digital systems in place like K-Smart (Kerala - Solution for Managing Administrative Reformation and Transformation), SPARK (Service and Payroll Administrative Repository for Kerala) and Aadhar to check the eligibility of applicants. 

Vijayan said K-Smart had all the necessary data from the local bodies to check if an applicant receives other pensions. If an applicant is enrolled in any government assistance scheme, he said that it could also be identified through SPARK. 

Vijayan also dismissed the charge that the benefits were transferred to people close to the CPM. "Transparency was the hallmark of the pension scheme," the former Chief Minister said. "The Chief Minister said that there was politics behind the selection of beneficiaries. Fact is, the most number of applications had come from Malappuram, 2.5 lakh. The second most number of applicants came from Palakkad," Vijayan said, suggesting that these were districts where the CPM had relatively less influence.

Further, Vijayan said that no deliberate curbs were applied by his government on the number of applications, as the CM had insinuated. "There were 14 lakh applications in the first two weeks itself. More will register in the coming days and months. You cannot expect all the eligible women to enroll in the first few days. Even now, five lakh applications have not been processed," the Opposition Leader said.

Interestingly, the LDF did not stage a walkout as is usual when an adjournment motion is rejected. "Why this unnecessary grudge against poor women. We still are hopeful that the government would turn sensitive to the needs of women and change accordingly," the Opposition Leader said, stopping short of announcing a walkout.