Budget proposes schemes to widen social security net

In order to ensure social security and promote public health, the government today proposed a slew of schemes like Pradhan Mantri Suraksha Bima Yojna, ATAL Pension Yojana and tax incentives for National Pension System.
"A large proportion of India's population is without insurance of any kind - health, accidental or life. Worryingly, as our young population ages, it is also going to be pension-less," Finance Minister Arun Jaitley said while presenting Budget for 2015-16 in the Lok Sabha.
"Encouraged by the success of the Pradhan Mantri Jan Dhan Yojana, I propose to work towards creating a universal social security system for all Indians, specially the poor and the under-privileged," he said.

The soon-to-be-launched Pradhan Mantri Suraksha Bima Yojna will cover accidental death risk of Rs 2 lakh for a premium of just Rs 12 per year, he said.
"Similarly, we will also launch the ATAL Pension Yojana, which will provide a defined pension, depending on the contribution, and its period. To encourage people to join this scheme, the Government will contribute 50 per cent of the beneficiaries' premium limited to Rs 1,000 each year, for five years, in the new accounts opened before December 31, 2015," he said.
"The third Social Security Scheme that I wish to announce is the Pradhan Mantri Jeevan Jyoti Bima Yojana which covers both natural and accidental death risk of Rs 2 lakhs," he said.

The premium will be Rs 330 per year, or less than one rupee per day, for the age group 18-50, he said.

It is proposed to increase the limit of deduction under 80CCD of the Income-tax Act on account of contribution by the employee to National Pension Scheme (NPS) from Rs 1 lakh to Rs 1.50 lakh, he said.
It is also proposed to provide a deduction of up to Rs 50,000 over and above the limit of Rs 1.50 lakh in respect of contributions made to NPS, he added.
The Finance Minister said there are unclaimed deposits of about Rs 3,000 crore in the PPF, and approximately Rs 6,000 crore in the EPF corpus.

"I have proposed the creation of a Senior Citizen Welfare Fund, in the Finance Bill, for appropriation of these amounts to a corpus which will be used to subsidize the premiums of vulnerable groups such as old age pensioners, BPL card- holders, small and marginal farmers and others. A detailed scheme would be issued in March," he said.