Dulari Scheme

What is the Dulari Scheme?

Dulari Scheme is a girl-child incentive programme run by the Directorate of Health Services under the Health Department of the Union Territory of Andaman and Nicobar Islands. The Administration launched the scheme on 26 January 2013, replacing the older Planned Family Scheme, and designed it to attach a cash value to three things at once: the birth of a daughter, her continued presence in school, and a marriage that does not happen too early.

According to the scheme documentation published on the Government of India myScheme portal, Dulari gives incentives to newborn baby girls and to girl children on passing the VIII, X and XII standards. The scheme is often written locally simply as "Dulari", and islanders searching for it will also see it described as the Dulari girl child scheme of the A&N Health Department.

Two design choices make Dulari different from a plain cash transfer. First, the money is not handed over as spending cash, it is fixed in a bank account held for the girl and must not be withdrawn before she attains 18 years of age unless the Andaman and Nicobar Administration permits it. Second, the incentives are staged: a family that collects the birth incentive and then withdraws the daughter from school forfeits everything that would have followed.

Who is eligible for the Dulari Scheme?

A girl child qualifies if:

• Her parents are domiciled in the Union Territory of Andaman and Nicobar Islands. A local certificate, domicile certificate or permanent resident certificate is the accepted proof.
• She was born on or after 26 January 2013, which makes her eligible for the full set of benefits including the birth incentive.
• She is between 0 and 13 years of age, was born before 1 October 2013, and was not registered under the earlier Planned Family Scheme. This transitional group is eligible only for the education incentives, starting from Class VIII.
• The applicant under the scheme is a woman or a girl child. The benefit is claimed for and held for the daughter.

Who cannot apply or is not eligible:

• Boys are not eligible. Dulari is a girl-child scheme and no incentive is paid for a male child.
• Families not domiciled in the Andaman and Nicobar Islands cannot apply, even if the birth took place in a hospital in Port Blair. Domicile of the parents, not the place of delivery, decides eligibility.
• Girl children born before 26 January 2013 who were already registered under the Planned Family Scheme are covered by that older scheme and are not eligible for a second birth incentive under Dulari.
• A girl who drops out of school is not eligible for the remaining education incentives, because each class incentive requires proof that she passed that class.
• A girl who is married before attaining 21 years of age loses the benefit, and no marriage incentive is payable in that case.

The Directorate of Health Services also cancels benefits where the applicant or her parents provide false or concealed information.

How much does the Dulari Scheme pay?

A girl born in a hospital who goes on to pass Class VIII, Class X and Class XII therefore accumulates Rs 43,000 across the birth and education milestones, before any marriage incentive is counted. The gap between Rs 8,000 for an institutional delivery and Rs 5,000 for a home delivery is deliberate: it is a Health Department scheme, and the extra Rs 3,000 is an inducement to deliver under medical supervision on islands where distance from a hospital is a real risk factor.

The amounts for the two marriage milestones are structured the same way. Rs 5,000 is payable on marriage at the age of 21, and twice that, Rs 10,000, if the marriage takes place after the age of 25. The scheme pays more for a later marriage, not less.

What documents are required for the Dulari Scheme?

How to apply for the Dulari Scheme online

1. Open the national service delivery portal at serviceonline.gov.in, which the Andaman and Nicobar Administration uses to receive Dulari applications.
2. On the home page click Register, fill in all the mandatory details, click Submit, and validate your email ID and mobile number using the OTP received. After successful validation your citizen account is created.
3. Log in with the email ID used at registration, enter your password and the captcha, and click Login.
4. After logging in, click Apply for Services, then View all Available Services.
5. Search for "Dulari" and click on Dulari Registration.
6. Fill in all the mandatory details about the girl child, the parents, the domicile particulars and the bank account, and upload the scanned documents.
7. Preview the completed form, correct anything that reads wrong, and click Submit.
8. Save the registration ID displayed on screen. Every later milestone claim and every status enquiry is traced through this ID.

How to apply for the Dulari Scheme offline

1. Visit the Directorate of Health Services, Port Blair, or the government hospital or primary health centre attached to your island, and ask for the Dulari application.
2. Fill in the form and attach the birth certificate, domicile proof, ration card, Aadhaar of the parent and a copy of the bank passbook.
3. Submit the completed set at the counter and collect the acknowledgement carrying the reference number.

Islanders in Rangat, Diglipur, Mayabunder and Car Nicobar who cannot travel to Port Blair should route the application through the health facility on their own island rather than posting documents, so that the originals stay verifiable.

How to claim the education milestone incentives

Each of the three education incentives is claimed separately, after the result is declared. There is no single application that releases all of them.

1. Collect the marksheet for Class VIII, Class X or Class XII as soon as the result is published.
2. Obtain a bonafide certificate from the school, or a school leaving certificate if the girl has completed her schooling there.
3. Log in to serviceonline.gov.in with the same account, quote the existing Dulari registration ID, and submit the milestone claim with the marksheet.

The Class VIII incentive of Rs 5,000 is the one most often missed, because families assume that Dulari is only a birth scheme. It is the smallest of the three education amounts but it is also the checkpoint the scheme uses to confirm the girl is still in school.

How to check the status of a Dulari application

1. Log in to serviceonline.gov.in with the account used for the application.
2. Open the View Status of Application section from the citizen dashboard.
3. Enter the registration ID or application reference number and submit.

The status screen shows whether the application is pending with the Directorate of Health Services, has been returned for a document, or has been sanctioned. If the amount has been sanctioned but nothing appears in the account, the problem is almost always the bank details, and the fix is at the Directorate rather than at the bank.

Why Dulari applications get rejected

• Domicile proof missing or in the wrong name. The domicile that matters is that of the parents; a hospital record from Port Blair is not a substitute.
• Birth certificate does not state the place of delivery, so the Directorate cannot decide between the Rs 8,000 and Rs 5,000 birth rates.
• Girl born before the cut-off date. Births before 26 January 2013 do not attract the birth incentive.
• Already covered under the Planned Family Scheme. A child registered under the older scheme cannot draw the same benefit twice.
• No marksheet or bonafide certificate attached to an education milestone claim.
• False or concealed information, which causes the benefit to cease altogether rather than merely delaying it.

Help and grievance redressal

• Directorate of Health Services, Andaman & Nicobar Administration, Port Blair, the sanctioning office for Dulari.
• serviceonline.gov.in, the portal where applications are filed and their status tracked.
• The health facility on your own island can forward a grievance to the Directorate if travel to Port Blair is not practical.

Applying under the Dulari Scheme costs nothing. No fee is charged for the form, and no official will ask for an OTP sent to your mobile number.