Staff Reporter
Islamabad
The federal government on Tuesday approved removing over 600,000 beneficiaries of the Benazir Income Support Programme. The decision was taken on a recommendation forwarded by the Sania Nishtar-led Poverty Alleviation and Social Safety Division, taken up at the weekly federal cabinet meeting chaired by Prime Minister Imran Khan.
Pegged as the largest social safety programme, BISP provides cash transfers to about 5.1 million poor families across the country. It used the proxy means test methodology to ascertain the eligibility of the beneficiaries.
In its recommendation, the division said that a 2010-11 survey on socio-economic indicators for 27 million households across Pakistan established a cut-off poverty score at 16.17 to make ever-married women as BISP beneficiaries.
“The demographic and socio-economic status, as well as the composition of households, change with time,” reads the letter. “Over time some of these beneficiary households have become relatively better-off.”
The poverty alleviation and social safety division said a National Database and Registration Authority (NADRA) analysis of living standards of the BISP beneficiaries was conducted on the following baselines:
