An Empirical Study on DBT Awareness

The Direct Benefit Transfer (DBT) is a social security scheme launched by the government of India, with a prime objective to transfer of cash subsidy directly to the people living below poverty line and entitlements directly to the beneficiary, whose identification would be verified on the base of ‘Aadhaar Card’ linked with the bank account. Observably, this foresighted steps has been taken by the government of India after experiencing so many years of hurdles such as unnecessary delays, leakages and diversion of benefits which take place while providing subsidy to the needy people. In a country like India where more than 25% people are living below poverty line and the benefit of, Central and State Governments sponsored schemes are not reaching them. In spite of spending huge amount and deploying substantial workforce these poor classes are still struggling for their day to day needs like food, shelter, clothing, health, education etc. Various reasons can be mentioned behind this imbalance but it is a proven fact that all is not well. Certain major shortcomings in this regard are non-scientific method for the identification of the beneficiary, lack of proper and effective channels of distribution, lack of interest of implementation of concerning authority, delay in delivery of service, reaching beneficiaries not at its doorsteps and lack of awareness on the benefit of direct benefit transfer. Based on the above backdrop, this paper investigates the public awareness on direct benefit transfer in Vellore District, Tamil Nadu. The findings of this empirical study emphasis the public awareness about the direct benefit transfer scheme and its implication in India. DOI: 10.5901/mjss.2015.v6n5p22