COVID-19 in Maharashtra: 1.42 lakh deaths, 2.17 lakh ex gratia claims

In view of Mumbai's high death rate, most applications come from the state capital, followed by Pune and Thane. [Representative image]

According to Maharashtra's official death toll, 1.42 lakh people died from COVID-19. However, 2.17 lakh people applied for an ex gratia amount of Rs 50,000 to those who succumbed to the pandemic. Officials said that a third of the claims appear to be duplicates. So far, nearly 50,000 claims have been rejected while 1.10 lakh applications have been approved in the state, reported The Indian Express.

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After strictures were passed by the Supreme Court, Maharashtra government started disbursing the ex gratia to the kin of COVID-19 deceased patients on December 9, 2021. The 2.17 lakh applications recorded till January 18 is 34 percent more than its official COVID-19 death toll.

An official from the state relief and rehabilitation department told The Indian Express, “Nearly 30 percent of the total applications are duplications. So, this doesn’t indicate that Maharashtra has recorded 2.17 lakh COVID-19 deaths. During our investigation, we have also found that people with malign intentions submitted incorrect information to get the money.”

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Among the 1.10 lakh applications approved so far, 1.01 lakh have already received compensation. The officer informed that they are expecting the total authentic claim to be around 1.50 lakh with an addition of 8,000-10,000 extra deaths to the state’s official figure.

A total of 50,000 applications have been rejected. The second leading cause of rejections, other than duplications, is error in filling out the forms. For instance, under the ‘name of the deceased’ section, many applicants have mentioned ‘COVID-19’, considering it as ‘name of the disease’.
The district grievances redressal cell has received 9,000 appeals from the rejected applications. Mahacovid19relief.in offers the option to file a physical appeal.

To this end, committees - consisting of additional district collectors, the chief medical officer of health, and the head of a medical college's department of medicine among others - would be provided direct access to the medical records of deceased patients from the hospital and the public health department for examination.

The officer quoted above said that they were allocating appointment dates to avoid crowding of the applicants, considering the surge in COVID-19 cases.

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Compared to December 2021, the number of daily applications for the ex gratia has plunged from 10,000 to nearly 2,000 in January 2022. In view of Mumbai's high death rate, most applications come from the state capital, followed by Pune and Thane.

Further, additional commissioner, BMC, Suresh Kakani said, “Other than COVID-19 related queries, the war rooms also get a lot of calls regarding the ex gratia. The call attenders have been trained to address the queries.”

Considering the 1.42 lakh COVID-19 deaths in the state, the relief and rehabilitation department has estimated a budget of Rs 700 crore for compensation.