Scheme of Extending Family Maintenance Grant to the Families of the Deceased Famous Artists

What is the Family Maintenance Grant for families of deceased famous artists?

Scheme of Extending Family Maintenance Grant to the Families of the Deceased Famous Artists is a welfare grant of the Department of Art and Culture, Government of Tamil Nadu, implemented through the Tamil Nadu Eyal Isai Nataka Manram. The Manram is the state body for Eyal (literature), Isai (music) and Natakam (drama), and it is the same institution that confers the Kalaimamani award.

According to the Department of Art and Culture, the scheme provides one-time financial assistance of Rs 25,000 to the families of deceased renowned artistes for their family maintenance support. The grant was earlier Rs 10,000 and has been increased to Rs 25,000. The department records that 496 families have been helped under the scheme so far.

The reasoning behind the grant is simple and worth stating plainly. A large number of performing artistes in Tamil Nadu; drama actors, nadaswaram and thavil players, harmonium and mridangam accompanists, folk performers, dance teachers; work without a salary, without a pension and without an employer. When such an artiste dies, the household loses its only earning member and often has no provident fund, no gratuity and no insurance. The family maintenance grant is the state's immediate cash response to that situation.

Key features

• One-time payment of Rs 25,000, not a recurring pension.
• Paid to the legal heirs, not to the artiste's troupe or association.
• Administered by the Tamil Nadu Eyal Isai Nataka Manram, Department of Art and Culture.
• Sanctioned in batches against the number budgeted for the year, in 2024-25 a batch of 20 families was sanctioned Rs 5 lakh in total.

Who is eligible for the family maintenance grant?

Your family can claim if:

• The deceased was an artiste of standing in Tamil Nadu in Eyal, Isai, Natakam, Natyam, folk arts, cinema, television or a related performing art.
• The deceased was domiciled in Tamil Nadu.
• You are a legal heir, the surviving spouse first, then children, then dependent parents — and can prove it with a legal heirship certificate from the Tahsildar.
• You hold the death certificate issued by the local body.

You are not eligible if:

• You are not a legal heir of the artiste. A troupe manager, a student, a neighbour or a welfare association cannot apply on their own behalf, though they may help the family assemble the papers.
• The deceased has no demonstrable record as an artiste. The grant is not a general death benefit for any household in the state.
• The deceased was not a resident of Tamil Nadu.
• A grant has already been sanctioned to another heir for the same artiste. The Rs 25,000 is paid once per deceased artiste, not once per family member.

There is no published income ceiling and no published age condition for the claimant. Where the number of applications exceeds the number of grants budgeted for a year, the Manram exercises judgement on the standing of the artiste and the distress of the family.

What documents are required?

How to apply for the family maintenance grant

1. Obtain the death certificate of the artiste from the town panchayat, municipality or corporation where the death was registered. Take at least three attested copies, because the file, the district office and your own record each need one.
2. Apply to the Tahsildar for a legal heirship certificate, listing every surviving heir. This certificate decides who is legally entitled to receive the Rs 25,000 and is the paper most often missing when a file is returned.
3. Assemble the artistic record. Attach the Kalaimamani or State award citation if there is one, the Eyal Isai Nataka Manram or Folk Artistes Welfare Board registration or identity card, programme notices, press cuttings, recordings or letters from cultural institutions. The stronger this bundle, the faster the file moves.
4. Write the application addressed to the Tamil Nadu Eyal Isai Nataka Manram, Department of Art and Culture, Chennai, stating the artiste's name, art form, date of death, your relationship, and the grant sought under the family maintenance scheme.
5. Submit it either directly at the Directorate of Art and Culture in Chennai, or at the Regional Cultural Centre covering your district, which forwards applications to the Manram. Ask for a dated acknowledgement.
6. Attach the bank passbook copy and Aadhaar of the claiming heir, since the grant is released by transfer into that account.
7. Follow up with the Regional Cultural Centre after a month, quoting the acknowledgement, to confirm the file has reached the Manram.

How is the money paid?

The grant is a single payment of Rs 25,000 into the bank account of the heir named in the sanction. Payment is not made monthly and is not repeated in a following year. Batches of sanctions are frequently released together at a departmental function, for example, in the sanction announced for 2024-25, Rs 25,000 each was given for family maintenance to the legal heirs of 20 deceased artistes, a total of Rs 5 lakh, presented on 26 February 2025 alongside Porkizhi awards of Rs 1,00,000 each to 10 indigent senior Kalaimamani awardees.

How to check the status of your application

There is no online status tracker for this grant. Three practical routes work:

1. Ask the Regional Cultural Centre where you filed, quoting the date and acknowledgement number, whether the file has been forwarded.
2. Write to or visit the Directorate of Art and Culture, Chennai, and ask for the position of the file in the Eyal Isai Nataka Manram.
3. File a Right to Information application with the Public Information Officer of the Department of Art and Culture if the file has been pending for months without an answer.

Why applications get rejected, and how to fix them

• No legal heirship certificate, or a certificate that omits one of the heirs. Get it corrected by the Tahsildar rather than arguing the point later.
• Thin proof of artistic standing. A bare claim that the deceased "was a drama artist" rarely survives scrutiny. Add award citations, registration numbers, or letters from a sabha, a temple or a cultural institution.
• Name mismatch between the death certificate, the heirship certificate and the bank passbook. Tamil names transliterated differently across documents are the single most common clerical reason for delay.
• Duplicate claim where a second heir has already been sanctioned for the same artiste.
• Late or misdirected filing, an application left with a local association that never forwarded it. Always take a dated acknowledgement from a government office.

Related help for the artiste's family

If the deceased was a registered folk artiste with the Tamil Nadu Folk Artistes Welfare Board, the family should separately claim the Board's Rs 25,000 natural death and funeral expenses assistance, or Rs 1,00,000 where the death was accidental. Surviving artistes in the household may also be eligible for the Rs 3,000 a month assistance the Manram sanctions to aged indigent artistes, and children in the family may claim the Board's annual educational assistance, which runs from Rs 1,000 for a school student to Rs 8,000 for a postgraduate professional course with hostel facility.

Help and grievance route

• Directorate of Art and Culture, Government of Tamil Nadu, Chennai: artandculture.tn.gov.in
• Assistant Director, Regional Cultural Centre of your district, for submission and follow-up
• Tamil Nadu Eyal Isai Nataka Manram, the sanctioning body for this grant

No fee is payable at any stage. If anyone asks for money to "get the grant sanctioned", report it to the Directorate of Art and Culture in writing.