Centre withdraws clause of ex-gratia payment of Rs 4 lakh for coronavirus deaths, states can draw funds from SDRF

The Centre on Saturday modified its announcement made hours earlier about paying Rs 4 lakh to families of those whose members had died of coronavirus and said the disease would be treated as a "notified disaster" for the purpose of providing assistance under the State Disaster Response Fund (SDRF).

The disaster management division of the Union Home Ministry issued a letter to the Chief Secretaries of states wherein the clause ex-gratia payment of Rs 4 lakh to families of those who die of coronavirus was withdrawn.

"The Central government, keeping in view the spread of COVID-19 virus in India and the declaration of COVID-19 as a pandemic by the World Health Organisation (WHO), by way of a special one-time dispensation, has decided to treat it as a notified disaster for the purpose of providing assistance under SDRF," the letter said.

It said that the States/UTs can now draw funds from the State Disaster Response Fund in addition to the funds from the state government and the NHM.

The Ministry of Home Affairs issued detailed guidelines to States/UTs in this regard under the Disaster Management Act.

Last week, the World Health Organisation (WHO) has declared it has pandemic. Globally, atleast 145374 confirmed cases have been reported and more than 5400 people have lost their lives due to the disease.

So far, India has detected 84 positive confirmed cases of COVID19 and two patients claimed their lives.