Bihar Shatabdi AIDS Pirit Kalyan Yojana

What is Bihar Shatabdi AIDS Pirit Kalyan Yojana?

Bihar Shatabdi AIDS Pirit Kalyan Yojana is a monthly cash assistance scheme of the Social Welfare Department, Government of Bihar, for people living with HIV or AIDS who are residents of the state. The scheme is sometimes written locally as "Bihar Shatabdi AIDS Pidit Kalyan Yojana", and it belongs to the same family of "Shatabdi" welfare schemes that Bihar launched in its centenary year, alongside the Shatabdi leprosy welfare scheme and the Shatabdi social security scheme for unorganised workers.

Bihar Shatabdi AIDS Pirit Kalyan Yojana pays Rs 1,500 per month into the beneficiary's own bank account through Direct Benefit Transfer. The money is intended to cover nutrition, travel to the ART centre and everyday household costs during a period when a person's capacity to earn is often reduced. The scheme is funded entirely by the Government of Bihar, with no central share.

Why the scheme exists

• Antiretroviral treatment is free at government ART centres, but nutrition, transport and lost wages are not covered by any treatment programme.
• Regular monthly income reduces the chance that a person stops treatment midway because they cannot afford to travel to the centre.
• Direct Benefit Transfer removes the need to visit an office every month to collect money, which also protects the privacy of the beneficiary.

Reported coverage has run to roughly 63,000 people receiving Rs 1,500 a month under the scheme, which makes it one of the larger disease-linked assistance schemes run by any state in India.

Who is eligible for the AIDS assistance in Bihar?

You can get the benefit if:

• You are a resident of Bihar. The scheme is a state scheme and residence is the first condition checked.
• You are living with HIV or AIDS, and the diagnosis is confirmed by an ART centre or a designated government hospital. A private laboratory report on its own is not normally accepted; the ART registration record is what the department looks for.
• You have a bank account in your own name that is seeded with Aadhaar, since the payment is made only by Direct Benefit Transfer.

You cannot apply; or the file will not be approved: if:

• You are not a resident of Bihar, even if you are receiving treatment at an ART centre inside the state.
• Your HIV or AIDS status is not confirmed on a government medical record. Self-declaration is not enough.
• You have no bank account in your own name. A joint account held by a relative or an account in a guardian's name will hold up the payment.
• The same person is already drawing this assistance through a second registration in another district. Duplicate registrations are cancelled during verification.

Bihar Shatabdi AIDS Pirit Kalyan Yojana does not publish an age bar, so adults and children living with HIV are both covered, with a guardian's account used where the beneficiary is a minor. No caste condition applies, the scheme is open to applicants of every community.

What documents are required?

Keep two self-attested photocopies of every document. One set goes with the application and the second is useful if the district office asks for a fresh copy during verification.

How to apply for Bihar Shatabdi AIDS Pirit Kalyan Yojana

1. Get your ART registration record in order at the ART centre where you are under treatment. Ask the counsellor for the certificate or record that confirms your status, since this is the single document the application turns on.
2. Collect the prescribed application form from the district social welfare office, the office of the Bihar State AIDS Control Society, or the ART centre itself. The form is free.
3. Fill in the form completely — full name exactly as printed on Aadhaar, father's or husband's name, full address with block and panchayat, mobile number, and bank account number with IFSC code.
4. Attach self-attested copies of the medical record, Aadhaar card, residence proof, bank passbook and a passport-size photograph.
5. Submit the completed form with its enclosures at the same office from which you collected it, and ask for a dated acknowledgement or receipt number.
6. Follow up after three to four weeks with the district social welfare office to confirm that the file has been verified and sent for sanction.

There is no application fee at any stage. Nobody is authorised to charge you for "getting your name added" to the list, and no official will ask for your Aadhaar OTP over the phone.

How is the money paid and when?

Bihar Shatabdi AIDS Pirit Kalyan Yojana credits Rs 1,500 every month to the beneficiary's Aadhaar-seeded bank account through Direct Benefit Transfer. Payment is generated as a district-level batch, so credits for a whole block usually appear within a few days of each other rather than on a fixed calendar date. Arrears for the months between sanction and the first credit are normally released together with an early instalment.

Because the transfer is electronic, the beneficiary does not have to visit any office to collect money and nobody at the bank branch needs to be told why the credit is arriving.

How do I check my application or payment status?

1. Open elabharthi.bihar.gov.in, the state's beneficiary payment-tracking portal for social security payments.
2. Choose the payment or beneficiary search option and enter your beneficiary number, Aadhaar number or account details as prompted.
3. Note the last credited month shown on the screen and compare it with your bank passbook.
4. If the portal shows a payment as released but your passbook does not show the credit, take a printout to your bank branch. The problem is usually a broken Aadhaar seeding at the bank end, not a missing sanction.

For the stage of a fresh application, the district social welfare office is the only reliable source. Carry the acknowledgement receipt you were given at submission.

Why applications get rejected, and how to fix them

• Medical proof from a private lab only. Replace it with the ART centre record or a certificate from a designated government hospital.
• Name mismatch between Aadhaar, the bank passbook and the medical record. Correct the spelling at the bank or through Aadhaar update before resubmitting; a mismatch of even one letter blocks DBT.
• Bank account not Aadhaar-seeded. Ask the branch for the NPCI seeding to be done and confirm it a week later.
• Account dormant. An account with no transaction for a long period is frozen by the bank and the credit bounces back. A single small deposit reactivates it.
• Incomplete residence proof. Apply for a residence certificate through the RTPS counter at your block office and attach it.
• Duplicate registration across two districts. Withdraw the older file in writing and keep the one for your current district of residence.

Most rejections are documentary rather than substantive, so a corrected file submitted at the same office is usually sanctioned without a fresh waiting period.

Where do I complain if the payment stops?

• District Social Welfare Officer of your district, the first authority for sanction, suspension and restart of payment.
• Assistant Director, Social Security at the district level, for pension and assistance payment disputes.
• The ART centre counsellor, who can re-issue or re-attest the medical record if that is what is holding the file up.
• Directorate of Social Security, Social Welfare Department, Patna, for cases the district has not settled.

Confidentiality matters here more than in most schemes. The department handles the file under its own procedures, and a beneficiary is not obliged to disclose their status to a panchayat representative or to any agent to get the application moved.

What the scheme does not do

Bihar Shatabdi AIDS Pirit Kalyan Yojana does not replace medical treatment. Free antiretroviral therapy, CD4 testing and counselling continue at government ART centres under the national AIDS control programme, and this cash assistance is over and above that treatment. The scheme also does not bar a beneficiary from receiving other benefits they separately qualify for, such as a ration card entitlement or a disability certificate benefit, since it is not framed as a pension in lieu of other support.