As per reports, India’s elderly population i.e. 60+ years is projected to touch 194 million in 2031 from 138 million in 2021, which will be a 41% increase in next 10 years.
The larger point of debate is, how well are we prepared to address the pressing needs of the elderly population of India.
Since welfare is a State subject hence it is important that all 28 States and 8 Union Territories should move in the same direction.
At the central level, Ministry of Social Justice & Empowerment is the nodal agency, but unfortunately they don’t have any control over the state social welfare departments. This becomes a precarious situation, because without ownership of the actual development work at the ground level, it is just paper work without any accountability .
On one hand India has progressed exponentially, however when it comes to Aged Care we are completely clueless. While sending satellites and rockets to the moon is also important, unfortunately it has no value if ordinary citizens are deprived of welfare schemes.
India has about 766 districts and each district has a website. At the state level, the social welfare department is supposed to upload relevant welfare schemes and guidelines to support the development at the district level.
After personality reviewing 700 odd district websites, I feel that, India is not geared up in the area of Eldercare. 99% of the districts do not talk about elderly care and 99% of state social welfare departments do not have any published standards or guidelines for promoting old age care.
In my opinion, as a society if we do not take corrective actions today, then in the next decade we will have a bigger problem which will become difficult to digest.
I have taken a random district website of Chennai and state social welfare department of Tamil Nadu as reference. It has no political or hidden objective.
Pankaj Mehrotra