Sikkim Grant of Award to Transgender (SGATT)

What is the Sikkim Grant of Award to Transgender?

Sikkim Grant of Award to Transgender, abbreviated SGATT on the state's own portal, is a welfare grant for transgender persons run by the Women, Child, Senior Citizen and Divyangjan Welfare Department, Government of Sikkim. The department's online registration system at pensionscheme.sikkim.gov.in lists SGATT as one of seven schemes it handles, and classifies it under State Innovative Schemes rather than the National Social Assistance Programme. That classification matters, because it means the money comes entirely from the Sikkim state budget and not from a central share.

SGATT sits alongside two other purely state-funded schemes on the same portal, the Sikkim Unmarried Women Pension at Rs 2,000 a month and the Chief Minister's State Disability Pension at Rs 1,500 a month. The four remaining schemes on the portal, the old age, widow and disability pensions and the National Family Benefit Scheme, carry a combined central and state share.

Sikkim was among the earlier Indian states to notify a dedicated transgender welfare grant, and the scheme is commonly referred to locally by its acronym SGATT or as the transgender award.

What does SGATT actually pay?

The department's incentives table lists the scheme under the heading "Sikkim Payment of Grant to the Transgender" with three components:

Two points deserve care. First, the portal prints the Rs 12,000 figure against "0-6 years", the reading of that bracket, and whether the amount is periodic or a one-time award, is not spelled out on the page, so confirm the payment cycle with the department before planning around it. Second, the Rs 500 monthly component is conditional on the beneficiary having actually completed an educational or technical qualification and still being without a job, not simply on being unemployed.

Who is eligible for the Sikkim transgender grant?

You can be enrolled if all of the following apply.

• You are a transgender person and hold a medical certificate certified by the Head of Department of Medicine, Gynaecology, Paediatrics or Surgery of STNM Hospital or a District Hospital in Sikkim. This is the only scheme-specific criterion the portal lists for SGATT.
• You hold a Sikkim Subject Certificate, Certificate of Identification or Residential Certificate, as the case may be.
• You belong to a Below Poverty Line household and hold an Antyodaya Anna Yojana or Priority Household ration card in terms of rule 6 of the Sikkim Food Security Rules, 2014 read with Notification No. 4/SJE & WD dated 1 February

• You possess an Aadhaar card.
• You have a bank account under the Pradhan Mantri Jan Dhan Yojana.

You cannot apply, or are not eligible, in these situations.

• You do not hold the hospital-issued medical certificate. A self-declaration or an identity card issued by another body does not replace it under the criteria the portal publishes.
• Your household is above the poverty line, or holds a ration card outside the Antyodaya and Priority Household categories.
• You are not a resident of Sikkim and cannot produce a Sikkim Subject Certificate, Certificate of Identification or Residential Certificate.
• You have no Aadhaar card or no Jan Dhan bank account, both of which are general criteria across every scheme on this portal.
• You are claiming the Rs 500 monthly unemployment component without having completed the educational or technical qualification the portal refers to.

What documents does SGATT require?

How to apply for the Sikkim Grant of Award to Transgender

1. Obtain the medical certificate first. Approach STNM Hospital in Gangtok or your District Hospital and ask for certification from the Head of Department of Medicine, Gynaecology, Paediatrics or Surgery. Without this document the application cannot proceed, and it usually takes the longest to arrange.
2. Assemble the general documents — Sikkim Subject Certificate or Certificate of Identification, BPL ration card, Aadhaar card and Jan Dhan bank passbook.
3. Open pensionscheme.sikkim.gov.in and read the eligibility and incentives sections, then select Apply Now.
4. Log in through Sikkim GO at sso.sikkim.gov.in using your mobile number and one-time password, a username and password, or e-Pramaan. Create an account if you do not have one.
5. Open the Pension Scheme Registration service, choose Sikkim Grant of Award to Transgender as the scheme, and complete the personal, residence and bank details.
6. Upload the scanned documents and submit the form, then save the acknowledgement number the portal displays.
7. Follow up with the department at Gangtok if you hear nothing, quoting the acknowledgement number.

A Common Service Centre village level entrepreneur can log into Sikkim GO and file the application on your behalf; the SSO home page carries a separate CSC login for that purpose.

How is the grant paid and kept running?

SGATT is credited to the Jan Dhan bank account recorded at registration, in the same way as the pensions on the portal. The department applies a common requirement across all seven schemes on this platform. An annual life certificate. The portal carried a notice fixing 28 February as the last date for submission of the life certificate for the year 2026. Beneficiaries who miss that filing find payments stopped even though their underlying eligibility has not changed.

If you move bank or branch, tell the department in writing. If you take up employment, the Rs 500 monthly unemployment component no longer applies, and continuing to draw it exposes you to recovery.

Why SGATT applications get stuck

• The medical certificate is signed by a doctor other than a Head of Department of one of the four named specialities, or by a hospital outside the state system.
• The applicant's ration card is not of the Antyodaya or Priority Household category, so BPL status is not established.
• Name mismatches between Aadhaar, the ration card and the bank passbook.
• The bank account is not a Jan Dhan account.
• The life certificate was not filed, which halts an already sanctioned grant.

Fix the underlying document and resubmit under the same Sikkim GO login rather than opening a new account, so the department can trace the earlier submission.

Where to get help

Queries and grievances on SGATT go to the Women, Child, Senior Citizen and Divyangjan Welfare Department, Government of Sikkim, Gangtok. Sikkim departmental websites also link directly to CPGRAMS for written grievances. The Sikkim GO single-window portal itself is run by the Department of Information Technology, Government of Sikkim, and is the place to raise problems with the login or the online form rather than with the scheme.

Registration is free. The department charges nothing to enrol a beneficiary under SGATT, and no agent can charge a fee for getting a name onto the list.

How to check your application status

The pension scheme portal does not publish a separate public tracking number lookup, so status checks run through the same Sikkim GO login used to apply.

1. Log in again at sso.sikkim.gov.in with the mobile number and OTP, username and password, or e-Pramaan credentials you used at registration.
2. Open the Pension Scheme Registration service from your Sikkim GO dashboard. A submitted SGATT application shows its current stage there: received, under verification at the department, sanctioned, or returned for correction.
3. Keep the acknowledgement number from submission ready. If the dashboard view is unclear or the application does not appear, quote this number when you contact the department rather than filing a fresh application.
4. If the status shows "returned" or "rejected", the reason is usually a document gap covered under the rejection reasons above; correct the specific document and resubmit under the same login so the record links to your original submission.
5. For an application that shows no movement for several weeks, follow up directly with the Women, Child, Senior Citizen and Divyangjan Welfare Department office in Gangtok, since the portal does not list a dedicated SGATT helpline number.
6. Once sanctioned, payment status is easiest to confirm through your Jan Dhan bank account statement or passbook update, since the grant is credited there rather than notified separately on the portal.
7. If you are already receiving the grant, the one status check that matters most is the annual life certificate. Confirm each year, before the department's published cut-off, that your life certificate has been recorded, because an unfiled certificate stops payment even when your underlying eligibility is unchanged.

For login problems with Sikkim GO itself, such as an OTP not arriving or a forgotten password, the issue lies with the Department of Information Technology, Government of Sikkim, which runs the single sign-on system, not with the welfare department that decides SGATT applications.