With the Covid-19 death tally logging a significant rise across some states by way of claims received for the Covid ex-gratia amount of ₹50,000, the Supreme Court on Friday observed that states may have to rework their official figures once the final tally is available.
Monitoring the Covid ex-gratia rollout across the country, the bench of justices MR Shah and BV Nagarathna observed, “In some states, deaths are lower while claims are high. It can’t be that these claims are false. This means that official statistics (as recorded earlier by states) is not true. Now they will have to redo the official figures after this exercise.”
For instance, in Gujarat, as against recorded deaths of 10,089, the state received 102,230 claims of which over 82,000 claims were settled till Thursday. A fortnight ago, Gujarat had received over 89,000 claims, showing a significant rise in the number of Covid-19 deaths in the state.
The Court was going through a status report prepared by additional solicitor general (ASG) Aishwarya Bhati which indicated a constant rise in number of claims across states, with some reporting huge numbers.
It was on June 30, that the Supreme Court directed that people who had died due to Covid-19 were entitled to receive ex-gratia compensation. This amount was quantified at ₹50,000 in October. After a nudge by the Court, states were forced to engage in an active publicity campaign and even reach out to the family members of registered Covid-19 deaths.
Maharashtra, which got 213,890 claims as on January 18 as against 142,705 official deaths, continued to receive more claims, with the tally reaching 227,107 as per the latest status report submitted to the Court. Kerala was another state which came out with big numbers as the state marked a jump from 27,274 claims (as on January 18) to 44,864, of which payment has been completed in 40,000 odd cases. This is still less than the official death count in the state of 52,786.
Marginal increase in Covid-19 death claims was also noted in Andhra Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Punjab, Tamil Nadu, Telangana, Uttar Pradesh, West Bengal, Chhattisgarh, Haryana and Odisha. Delhi informed the Court that out of 33,554 recorded deaths, it had received over 29,000 claims of which payment was made in 26,720 cases.
Reiterating that nobody entitled to compensation should be left out, the bench put an outer limit on releasing payments against claims by saying, “States should make all endeavours to pay compensation, maximum within a period of 10 days from the receipt of claim.
Karnataka denied that cheques bounced due to lack of funds and said it could have returned on account of lack of KYC of the claimant or a non-operational bank account.
The petitioner – lawyer Gaurav Kumar Bansal, on whose petition the Court directed payment of ex-gratia, informed the Court about a news report from Karnataka where cheques issued by the state towards Covid-19 compensation bounced. The bench said, “Every government should ensure government cheques do not bounce,” pointing out that states need not make any budgetary allocation for this amount as the same is to be paid out of the state disaster relief fund.
The bench also pulled up Maharashtra as it noted that the Bombay high court was forced to intervene in some cases where the claims submitted by people offline got rejected. Advocate Rahul Chitnis representing the state clarified that those cases have been reviewed since.
The judges found that Maharashtra had rejected a fairly large number of claims, nearly 61,848. “Except duplication of claims, states should not reject any claim. No government is doing charity. As a welfare state, it is your duty to pay every claim,” the bench observed. The Court directed Maharashtra to supply particulars of all rejected claims to the state legal services authority (SLSA) within a week for scrutiny of grounds of rejection.
The states also informed the Court that children who became orphans due to Covid-19 are also being paid ex-gratia compensation. The Court directed all states to share full particulars of official deaths, persons who filed claims, and orphans entitled for ex-gratia to the respective SLSAs so that those who are yet to apply could be contacted through the legal service authorities at district and taluka level and para-legal volunteers working at these levels.
An officer not below the rank of Deputy Secretary working in the secretariat of Chief Minister in every state was directed to be the nodal officer to coordinate with the respective SLSAs. The bench directed the matter to be heard next on March 7.
