Financial Assistance to Poor Scheduled Caste People Suffering From Prolonged Diseases

What is this scheme?

Financial Assistance to Poor Scheduled Caste People Suffering From Prolonged Diseases is a monthly cash assistance run by the Adi Dravidar Welfare and Scheduled Tribes Welfare Department, Government of Puducherry. The scheme supports a Scheduled Caste person who has become unable to work and earn because of a long-running illness, and whose household therefore has no way of absorbing both the loss of income and the cost of continuing treatment.

The department's stated objective is to assist poor Scheduled Caste people who are unable to work for earning their livelihood due to a prolonged disease such as cancer, heart disease and asthma, at the rate of Rs 500 per month.

The scheme runs in all four regions of the Union Territory. The Yanam regional office of the Adi Dravidar Welfare and Scheduled Tribes Welfare Department, for example, issues its own annual notice for renewal cases under the scheme, which tells you that the department treats sanction as a yearly decision rather than a permanent entitlement.

How much is paid?

The assistance is Rs 500 per month, or Rs 6,000 over a full year, credited to the beneficiary's own bank account.

Rs 500 a month is a small sum against the cost of treating cancer or heart disease, and it is not intended to cover treatment. It functions as a maintenance allowance for a person who has lost their earning capacity: money for food, travel to hospital and routine medicines, while the treatment itself is expected to run through the government hospital system and health insurance schemes.

Who is eligible?

A person can apply if:

• The applicant is a citizen of India.
• The applicant belongs to the Scheduled Caste community.
• The applicant is at least 18 years of age.
• The applicant has resided continuously in Puducherry for at least five years.
• Annual family income does not exceed Rs 2,00,000.
• The applicant suffers from a prolonged disease; cancer, heart disease, asthma or similar, and is unable to work for a livelihood, certified by a government hospital.

A person cannot apply if:

• They do not belong to a Scheduled Caste. The scheme is category-specific; other residents should look to the Directorate of Social Welfare's general schemes.
• They are under 18 years of age.
• Their annual family income exceeds Rs 2,00,000.
• They cannot show five years' continuous residence in Puducherry.
• They cannot obtain a medical certificate from a government hospital confirming the prolonged illness and the inability to work. A private hospital certificate is not accepted in place of it.
• The illness is short-term or the person continues to work normally, since the scheme turns on the loss of earning capacity rather than on a diagnosis alone.

What documents are required?

Take originals with self-attested photocopies to the office. The originals are returned after verification.

How to apply for the prolonged disease assistance

1. Get the medical certificate first. Visit the government hospital where you are being treated, the Government General Hospital in Puducherry, Karaikal, Mahe or Yanam, and ask the treating doctor for a certificate that names the disease and states that you are unable to work for a livelihood. That wording matters; a diagnosis alone is not enough.
2. Obtain a Scheduled Caste certificate from the Revenue authorities, if you do not already hold one, and a current income certificate showing annual family income up to Rs 2,00,000.
3. Collect the remaining papers: residence proof covering five years, Aadhaar card, bank passbook in your own name and age proof.
4. Apply online at edistrict.py.gov.in. Register a user account, log in, select the Adi Dravidar Welfare Department from the department-wise list, choose the financial assistance for prolonged illness service, complete every mandatory field, upload the documents and submit. Save the reference number.
5. Or apply offline at the Adi Dravidar Welfare Department office for your region, submitting the completed form with self-attested photocopies. Collect the acknowledgement.
6. Respond to any verification the department calls for, and check your bank passbook once sanction is communicated.

How do I check my application status?

1. Log in to edistrict.py.gov.in and open the tracking section with your application reference number.
2. For an offline application, contact the Adi Dravidar Welfare Department office in your region with the acknowledgement number.
3. Watch the regional notices, the Yanam office, for instance, publishes scheme notices on yanam.gov.in, and similar notices are issued in the other regions.
4. Once sanctioned, confirm the Rs 500 monthly credit in your bank passbook.

Common reasons applications are rejected

• Medical certificate from a private hospital, or one that records the diagnosis without saying the applicant cannot work. Go back and get the wording corrected.
• Caste certificate missing, or issued by an authority outside Puducherry.
• Income above Rs 2,00,000, checked against the income certificate.
• Residence short of five years.
• Applicant under 18, in which case the household should look at other schemes.
• Bank account not in the applicant's own name, which causes the credit to fail after sanction.
• Renewal not filed when the department called for renewal cases, which stops an existing payment.

Key dates and renewal

The scheme accepts applications through the year, but the department treats continuation as an annual decision. Regional offices issue notices calling for renewal cases for each financial year, the Yanam office's notice for 2025-26 is an example — and a beneficiary who does not respond can find the payment stopping. Keep an updated medical certificate ready each year, and watch the regional notice board and website.

How this fits with treatment funding

Rs 500 a month does not pay for cancer or cardiac treatment, and the scheme is not designed to. A household dealing with a prolonged illness in Puducherry should treat this assistance as one strand of a wider plan:

• Treatment itself runs through the government hospital system. The Government General Hospital and Indira Gandhi Medical College and Research Institute in Puducherry, and the regional government hospitals in Karaikal, Mahe and Yanam; where the same medical certificate needed for this scheme is generated.
• Health insurance cover under the Union Territory's and the central government's health assurance arrangements meets hospitalisation costs for eligible families.
• This scheme meets the maintenance gap left when the patient can no longer earn.

Applying for this assistance therefore makes most sense alongside, not instead of, enrolling for health cover. The medical certificate you obtain for one application often supports the other.

Other Adi Dravidar Welfare schemes for the same household

The department's programmes for Scheduled Caste families run wide, and the caste certificate, income certificate and residence proof assembled for this application will serve for most of them:

• Opening and Maintenance of Boys and Girls Hostels; free board and lodging for students studying away from home.
• Award of Pre-matric Scholarship to SC students, and the separate award for students whose parents are engaged in unclean occupations, at Rs 1,850 a year.
• Post-matric scholarships for students past Class 10.
• Grant of house construction subsidy and distribution of free house sites.
• Supply of dhotis and sarees to Scheduled Caste people.
• Financial assistance for construction of sanitary latrines, and assistance for poor pregnant and lactating women.

Help and grievance redressal

• Adi Dravidar Welfare and Scheduled Tribes Welfare Department, Government of Puducherry; adwelfare.py.gov.in
• Scheme listing, adwelfare.py.gov.in/programmes-schemes
• Online applications; edistrict.py.gov.in
• Government of Puducherry department page; py.gov.in/adi-dravidar-welfare-and-scheduled-tribes-welfare
• Regional notices for Yanam, yanam.gov.in

There is no fee to apply. No official or agent may charge you for filing or forwarding an application under this scheme.