58,000 miss out on welfare benefits in February

The Welfare Benefits Board reported that 58,653 welfare beneficiaries were unable to receive benefits in February due to various technical issues.

Additionally, the board revealed that 39,855 beneficiaries have yet to open a bank account, further complicating the disbursement process.

This information was provided by the Welfare Benefits Board in response to an inquiry by Mawbima under the Right to Information Act No. 12 of 2016.

The board outlined several reasons for the delays, including 3,768 cases of objections and appeals pending at the Divisional Secretariat level, 1,381 cases of two applicants using the same National Identity Card (NIC) number, 11,828 cases of individuals being listed in two families, 427 cases of two beneficiaries sharing the same bank account number, and 13 unresolved Aswesuma benefit applications.

Moreover, there were 1,381 instances where the NIC number provided to the Divisional Secretariat did not match the one in the Aswesuma bank account, and 13 beneficiaries were awaiting benefits due to discrepancies in family member counts between the application submission and the census.

As of February 2025, there were 1,792,626 Aswesuma beneficiaries, with 1,733,973 receiving benefits during that month.