Marriage Assistance — Folk Artist (Tamil Nadu)

What is the folk artist marriage assistance?

Marriage Assistance is one of the welfare benefits of the Tamil Nadu Folk Artistes Welfare Board, which functions under the Department of Art and Culture, Government of Tamil Nadu. The board pays a registered folk artiste member Rs 5,000 towards the expenses of a marriage. The member's own marriage, or the marriage of the member's son or daughter, and the benefit can be claimed up to two times.

The board exists because folk performance in Tamil Nadu is overwhelmingly informal work. The state's folk traditions; therukoothu, villuppattu, karagattam, oyilattam, parai, poikkal kudhirai, silambam performance, devarattam and many others, are sustained by artistes who perform at temple festivals, village functions and marriages, mostly on a per-engagement basis, with no employer, no provident fund and no pension. The Folk Artistes Welfare Board is the state's answer to that: a registration-based welfare fund that gives such artistes a formal identity and a set of small, life-event benefits.

The whole system therefore turns on membership. Registration costs Rs 100, renewal is Rs 10 every two years, and a duplicate identity card costs Rs 20. Enrolment is open to folk artistes who have completed 18 years but not completed 60 years of age. The board records that a sum of Rs 1,98,72,917 has been sanctioned towards various welfare schemes to 9,011 eligible folk artistes, which gives a sense of the scale. This is a fund reaching thousands of families with modest amounts rather than a few with large ones.

The condition attached to the marriage assistance is exact and worth quoting in substance: the benefit goes to a registered folk artiste member who has renewed his or her membership properly. A lapsed card is the difference between a Rs 5,000 claim and nothing, and renewal costs Rs 10.

Who is eligible for the folk artist marriage assistance?

You can claim if:

• You are a registered member of the Tamil Nadu Folk Artistes Welfare Board, holding the board's identity card.
• Your membership is current — renewed properly, at Rs 10 every two years.
• The marriage is your own, or that of your son or daughter.
• You have not already claimed this assistance twice, since the benefit is available only two times.
• You have not received the same benefit under another scheme, and the Village Administrative Officer will certify that.
• You can produce the marriage invitation and photographs of the couple taken at the marriage.

You cannot claim if:

• You are not registered with the board. Registration must precede the claim; a folk artiste who registers after the marriage cannot bring a past marriage into the scheme.
• Your membership has lapsed and was not renewed as required.
• The marriage is of a relative other than your son or daughter, a brother, sister, grandchild or nephew is not covered.
• You have already drawn the benefit twice.
• You have drawn marriage assistance from another board or department for the same marriage. Tamil Nadu runs marriage assistance schemes through the Labour Welfare Board, the Social Welfare Department and the differently abled welfare department, and the non-duplication certificate exists to prevent double claiming.
• You were 60 years or over at the time of enrolment, since the board's membership window closes at 60.

What else does the Folk Artistes Welfare Board provide?

Marriage assistance is one item in a set, and a registered member should know the whole list, because the same card unlocks all of it:

Alongside the welfare board benefits, the Department of Art and Culture runs separate schemes through the Tamil Nadu Eyal Isai Nataka Manram, including financial assistance of Rs 3,000 per month to aged indigent artistes, a one-time family maintenance grant of Rs 25,000 to the families of deceased artistes, grants of Rs 2,000 to individual folk artistes and Rs 6,000 to folk troupes for instruments and costumes, and the Kalaimamani awards. A folk artiste in difficulty should ask about all of these at the same office rather than only about the one they came in for.

What documents are required?

How to apply for folk artist marriage assistance

1. Confirm that your membership is current. Check the renewal endorsement on your identity card. If it has lapsed, renew it; Rs 10 for two years; before filing anything else, because the claim will be checked against this first.
2. If you are not yet registered, apply for membership with proof of residence, age and family composition such as the ration card and Aadhaar, a Village Administrative Officer's certificate that you are a folk artiste, three passport size photographs, photographs of your performances, and the Rs 100 registration fee. Membership is open between 18 and 60 years of age.
3. Keep the marriage invitation and take photographs of the couple at the marriage. These are not optional extras; the board names them as required documents.
4. Obtain the Village Administrative Officer's certificate stating that you have not availed this benefit from any other scheme.
5. Collect and complete the marriage assistance application form from the Department of Art and Culture or the Folk Artistes Welfare Board.
6. Attach the identity card copy, invitation, marriage photographs, VAO certificate, Aadhaar and bank passbook, and submit the application to the board.
7. Collect a dated acknowledgement and note the reference number for follow-up.

How to check the status of your claim

1. Quote the acknowledgement reference to the Folk Artistes Welfare Board, or to the Department of Art and Culture at 044-28193157.
2. Ask whether the file is pending on membership verification, on the VAO certificate, or on sanction.
3. Check the bank account after sanction, since the credit may arrive without separate intimation.
4. Escalate through the Department of Art and Culture at artandculture.tn.gov.in, or through the Chief Minister's Special Cell at cmhelpline.tn.gov.in.

Why folk artist marriage assistance claims fail

• Membership lapsed. The single most common and most avoidable failure. Renewal is Rs 10 every two years.
• Not registered at all at the time of the marriage. Registration cannot be backdated to cover a past event.
• No marriage invitation or photographs. The board asks for these specifically; a claim without them is incomplete.
• No VAO non-duplication certificate, or a certificate that does not say what the board requires it to say.
• Benefit already drawn twice, or drawn once for the same marriage from another welfare board.
• Claim for a relative other than a son or daughter.
• Name mismatch between the identity card, Aadhaar and the bank passbook.
• Applying long after the marriage, when the invitation and photographs are no longer available and the event is hard to verify.

Help and grievance redressal

• Tamil Nadu Folk Artistes Welfare Board: artandculture.tn.gov.in/tamil-nadu-folk-artistes-welfare-board
• Department of Art and Culture, Chennai: 044-28193157, artandculture.tn.gov.in
• Village Administrative Officer, for the artiste certification at registration and the non-duplication certificate at claim.
• District Art Society. The district-level body through which many of the department's schemes are routed.
• Chief Minister's Special Cell: cmhelpline.tn.gov.in

Registration and renewal fees are the only payments a folk artiste should ever make, and they are paid to the board against a receipt. No intermediary can obtain a sanction, and no payment should be made to anyone else.