Aruna Kumari, a forty-year-old woman who works as a helper at the Disha One Stop Centre in Visakhapatnam, is a single mother of two school-going girls. This year her children were not allowed to sit for the exams as she was unable to pay their school fees on time. She was called to the principal’s office, where she asked for an extension of two more days. “I took a loan of Rs 25,000 from a ‘madam’ to pay the fees. My children have studied in the same school since pre-primary. The principal is aware of my situation and allowed my children to write exams after clearing dues,” said Aruna.
Many members of staff at One Stop Centres (OSC) across Andhra Pradesh have not received salaries for several months now. Five members of staff at the Disha OSC centre in Nellore have not been attending to their duties since they have not been paid salaries for the last 18 months. Five employees at the Disha OSC centre in Vizianagaram also quit recently since they have not been paid for 15 months now. The OSC centre in Visakhapatnam, a city with high crime rates in Andhra Pradesh, is also facing a staff crunch as five employees left due to non-payment of salaries for six months.
One Stop Centres provide medical, legal, infrastructural, and psychological assistance, as well as temporary shelter to women and children in distress. They are part of a centrally-sponsored scheme under Mission Shakti (an umbrella scheme for the safety, security, and empowerment of women), sponsored by the Ministry of Women and Child Development (WCD).
The OSC scheme has been in place since April 1, 2015, and is currently implemented in each district of the country. Each OSC has 18 staff including a case worker, paramedical staff, helpers, IT staff and security, working three shifts a day. Additionally, there is a centre administrator, legal staff, a lawyer and a counsellor (a female police facilitation officer is also stationed at the centre). Since most employees have been unpaid for months in Andhra Pradesh, they are torn between quitting and hoping that the government will pay them someday.
One Stop Centre at King George Hospital in Visakhapatnam
The centre administrators, who are in charge of the respective centres in Nellore, Vizianagaram, and Visakhapatnam, told TNM that even after repeated representations to the project directors at the departments, there has been no response. Shahanaz Shaikh, in charge of the Disha OSC at Nellore, said, “A few staff members have come to me with tears saying that they will not be able to continue at work because of the pressure at home. Women staff are coming to work, but they are being pushed back to their houses because of the delay in payment of salaries.”
TNM tried to contact the officials at the accounts section of the Ministry of Women and Child Development in New Delhi. They informed that the districts have not sent the undertakings and documentation checklist for the Single Nodal Account (SNA) as per the new guidelines of the Ministry. In September 2022, the MWCD issued new regulations for Mission Shakti, which increased the centre's monthly funding from Rs 2 lakh to Rs 2.35 lakh while reducing the number of employees per centre from 18 to 13. It was made compulsory to transfer the grants released to the districts/ States/ Union Territories prior to the issue of these guidelines to the SNA for the schemes under the Mission.
The introduction of SNA has delayed payments, according to district officials. Shantha Kumari, the project director at the Vizianagaram OSC said, “All the documents that have been asked for have been sent to the Union government multiple times.” The centre administrator at the OSC in Vizianagaram said that there are several other smaller bills that they sometimes are unable to claim. “We have to attend training at New Delhi once or twice a year as the project is funded by the Union government. Our case workers travel within the district to conduct awareness programmes. The cost of bus passes has increased and we spend at least Rs 1500 on travelling per month.”
Shahanaz said, “Sometimes we have to bring the victim from some other place to the centre in the absence of a police van, and we have to spend our money. When some special medicines are required, we have to buy them with money from our pockets. There is a delay in not just the processing of salaries, but also these other bills. On one hand, we don't get our salaries and on the other, we are spending from our savings.”
Recently, the Nellore district Police rescued Janani (name changed), who went missing from her home and admitted her to the district Disha One Stop Centre. The staff at the centre learnt that she was deeply depressed after being in a turbulent relationship with a man who manipulated her into it. The counselling staff spoke to her and sought police intervention to convince her to return home after she recovered. She is now a graduate degree holder working with a corporate. The centres offer interventions in the case of individuals like Janani who go through mentally sensitive issues. But according to P Mani, CITU (Centre of Indian Trade Unions) district general secretary of Visakhapatnam, delays in salary payment are forcing the staff to resign and look for other opportunities. “The women staff relentlessly provide free services to the distressed women at the centres now. Some of the staff resigned and have found other jobs with better pay. If wages are not received on time, the staff will not be motivated to work and may not be able to provide services,” Mani said.
“The state government has several times boasted about the kind of welfare they are providing to the women of the state. There are hardly 250 female staff working at the OSC. Does the state have to wait for funds from the Union government all the time?” Mani asked, adding that this is not the first time the staff are facing this problem. “When this issue first came up in 2021, we asked the centre administrators to send a representation and exert pressure on the Visakhapatnam collectorate office. The state government released the salaries from its funds, but two months later, the issue reappeared,” Mani recalled.
The state government stepped in and held a video conference on February 15 with the project directors of the districts and the centre administrators. According to one of the members who attended the meeting, the Andhra Pradesh WCD has instructed all the centres to expeditiously work on transferring the balance from regular accounts to the new SNA accounts and has also assured that the budget will be released as soon as possible.