India is home to the second largest population of elderly people.
But a recent global survey ranked India amongst the poorest nations to grow old.
In the next 20 years, it’s expected to be around 200 million elderly people in the country.
In New Delhi, hundreds of them from across India are now in New Delhi to demand a better pension scheme.
One of them is 75-year-old Mayni Mossamat, a widow from the eastern state of Bihar. She can’t see properly and can hardly walk. She begs for food and spends her nights on the street.
“I have 4 sons but they don’t look after me. They beat me and forced me to leave the house just because I asked them to give me some money. I was not well and needed the money for medicine. But they said ‘if we give you money what will our children do; do you want us to hang them?’ And my daughter-in-law refused to give me food because I am not able to help them with the house work.”
Mosammat is now in New Delhi with hundreds other elderly people from across India with similar stories.
They are on a sit-in protest for the last 3 weeks demanding a universal old age pension.
The protest has been organised by a collective of NGOs known as Pension Parishad. Purnima is a member of the group.
“Every senior citizen should get pension. The amount paid as pension should be at least either 40 US dollars a month or the equivalent of half the amount of minimum wages. The pension amount should be increased according to the inflation index the same way as salaries are increased.”
The Indian government already has a pension scheme running for elderly people. But it only covers those living below the poverty line and it’s merely 4 US dollars a month.
65-year-old Amna Bi is from the western state of Maharashtra. She lives with her son but he doesn’t earn enough to feed the family.
“It’s a tough life in old age. You have less income and more needs.”
“And food is not the only thing I need in this age. I worked and earned as long as I could but now I have no more energy left, neither for work nor for the unending hardships of life.”
The government had promised to revise the pension scheme after a similar protest by the elderly
people last year... but it has failed to do so.
The protesters now want an assurance that the issue would be addressed in the next session of the Parliament.
But it’s not the only solution, says Manjira Khurana, Country head with NGO Help Age India.
“We do a survey every year and we find that elder abuse in India is rising. Abuse in urban India has risen exponentially simply because of rampant inflation and because of increasing life expectancy. There’s no social security, there’s no health coverage so they are completely at the mercy of their children and the children beyond a point, so the elder is the cast-off.”
Khurana says India needs special laws to protect elderly people. She also urges the government to set up government-run old age homes.
“We are no longer a society which prides itself on caring for elders. We are no longer a society where the elders are venerated where they are treated as fonts of wisdom.”
