Seventy-two-year-old Shivarasu who ran a petty shop in Kancheepuram, woke up one morning to find his son trying to throw his wife and him out of his ancestral home. His wife, Lakshmi was assaulted and the gold chain around her neck was snatched by her son. The distraught parents took their case to the local Revenue Divisional Officer (RDO) who directed the son to take his parents back into the household. "They cut a really sorry figure," said Kancheepuram RDO S Palani. "The son was unemployed and he, his wife and children lived off the income that the old man got from the shop. He had already squandered the money the father gave him after selling off his land. Now he wanted the house and shop too. The mother, particularly, was traumatized by her son's aggression."
Shivarasu's case is one of the many that RDOs in Tamil Nadu are dealing with after the government set up tribunals (under the Maintenance and Welfare of Senior Citizens Act) to tackle cases relating to welfare and protection of senior citizens. To expedite cases of abuse against senior citizens, the state appointed RDOs in each district to head the tribunals. These officials are given magisterial powers to settle the disputes and fine and penalise the accused without lengthy court processes. Since the tribunals were set up in June 2010, cases registered have seen a steady rise, touching 254 by end of August.
RDOs help sr citizens skip court processes
To expedite cases of abuse against senior citizens, the state-appointed RDOs in each district will head the tribunals. These officials are given magisterial powers to settle the disputes and fine and penalise the accused without lengthy court processes.
"Earlier, when such cases could only be dealt with a court, the cases would take years to be settled," said Kancheepuram Revenue Divisional Officer (RDO) S Palani. "By which time, the parent or parents in question would have already passed away. Now with the new system, they could just walk into my office for a complaint. Most of them are also illiterate, so we file the forms and complaint letters for them. They also need not spend money on lawyers. We settle the cases within 90 days."
Says Lakshmi, the district social welfare officer for Tiruchi, "We have received around 25 cases so far. Most of them relate to children not sending money to their parents or are reluctant to look after them and even feed them."
The cases of neglect are, at times, shocking. "An old lady in Uttaranellur taluk, whose case I had overseen, was using one single dirty saree for the last six years because her son would not provide for her. In another such case, a widowed old lady, had been reduced to begging for food and money despite having six grown up sons with families of their own," says Kancheepuram RDO Palani.
Says Lakshmi, "Each session must be overseen by the district social welfare official, a police official apart from
the RDO," she said. "The RDO is empowered to either slap a fine or award a sentence of three months imprisonment."
However, according to the officials, they are often prevented from awarding the penalties and punishments by the parents themselves. Says Palani, "Though the parents usually file a complaint out of desperation, they still plead with us not to mete out any punishment to their children. The children, however, don't seem to understand how much the parents care for them."
According to R Vasuki, the director of Social Welfare, the response so far, has been quite encouraging. "We finished setting up tribunals all over the state by June 2010, during which time we publicized this facility in the districts," she said. "And the numbers have been pretty good. While in July, we had only 91 cases registered under the act, by August 31, 2010, the number had risen to 254."
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