Bhubaneswar/Brahmapur: The death of an elderly widow in Odisha’s Ganjam district after an alleged three-month delay in receiving her social security pension was not an isolated incident but the “outcome of a wider collapse in the state’s pension delivery system that left nearly 18 lakh beneficiaries without payments for months”, according to a joint fact-finding report released by three rights organisations.
The report, prepared by the Right to Food Campaign, Civil Society Forum for Human Rights and Campaign for Survival and Dignity, investigated the death of B. Sabitri Dora of Chadeiyapada village under Beguniapada block, who allegedly “consumed poison June 16 after repeatedly failing to receive her monthly widow pension of Rs 1,000.”
Calling the incident a “systemic failure” rather than an individual tragedy, the report argues that the state’s reliance on a digital pension payment system, without any contingency mechanism, left thousands of the poorest and most vulnerable citizens without their only source of income.
According to the report, Sabitri Dora, a widow in her mid-sixties, had been surviving almost entirely on her monthly pension after ill health forced her to stop working as a daily wage labourer nearly a decade ago. She also received 5 kg of rice every month under the National Food Security Act (NFSA) but depended on the pension to purchase medicines and meet other daily expenses, the report stated.
The fact-finding team found that “her pension had not been credited for nearly three months between April and June 2026”. During this period, she allegedly made repeated visits to the gram panchayat office, block office and her bank branch to enquire about the pending payment but received no assistance. Her family told the team that the prolonged uncertainty, mounting financial hardship and sense of helplessness ultimately drove her to take the extreme step, the report stated.
The report places her death within the context of a statewide disruption in pension disbursal. It states that more than 1.49 lakh beneficiaries in Ganjam district and nearly 18 lakh pensioners across Odisha reportedly did not receive their pensions for about three consecutive months because of technical problems in the digital Direct Benefit Transfer (DBT) system.
While the state government attributed the disruption to glitches in the SNA-SPARSH payment platform and later assured that all arrears would be cleared, the report contends that the absence of a manual or emergency payment mechanism exposed vulnerable beneficiaries to severe distress.
“The system created a situation where an elderly widow, entirely dependent on Rs 1,000 a month for food and medicines, was left without any support because of a technological failure over which she had no control,” the report stated.
It adds that although arrears were eventually released to lakhs of beneficiaries after the issue became a public controversy, the delay highlighted the lack of urgency and the absence of safeguards for those who rely solely on pensions for survival.
The report recommends that the government retain cash and doorstep pension disbursal as fallback options during digital failures and create a priority list of highly vulnerable beneficiaries — including elderly persons living alone, widows, persons with disabilities and destitute individuals — to ensure uninterrupted support.
It has also called for an independent review of the April-June 2026 pension disruption and urged the state government to place its findings before the Odisha Legislative Assembly.
UNI
