Action plan for TN policy on elderly care pending

CHENNAI: To address the concerns of elderly persons in Tamil Nadu, the Social Welfare and Women Empowerment Department framed the ‘Tamil Nadu State Policy on Senior Citizens 2023’. The policy was released by the government in October that year, but the action plan is yet to be officially released, claim stakeholders.

Observing that in 2030, the number of senior citizens will reach 1.5 crore in TN, the State government planned to frame a policy on elderly care. For this purpose, the government also formed a committee to draft the policy with 11 members.

The committee submitted the draft in July 2023, and the policy was released in October 2023 after modifying the draft as per suggestions and feedback from all the line departments and the public. Though the social welfare department assured that the action plan will be released before November 2024, nothing has happened as yet.

A committee member said that the release of the policy was unknown even to members. So, even beneficiaries wouldn’t have much knowledge of the details in the policy. “The department should quickly release the action plan or inform the public when it will be released. Action plan is key because it is a fall-back mechanism to beneficiaries, public and social workers to check on the implementation,” the member added.

As per the document, the focus areas in the policy are health and nutrition, social security scheme, livelihood/income security, housing and transportation, safety and security, institutional care, awareness and education, research and documentation, disaster management and mitigation and establishment of structures to implement the policy.

Department officials did not respond when contacted to know the status of the action plan for the policy.