Andhra’s six-lakh pension gap needs a number
The TDP-led government did raise pensions. The claimed collapse from 69 lakh beneficiaries is still waiting for a document.
The pension dispute turns on how the beneficiary count is defined and documented.
The TDP-led Andhra Pradesh government raised social-security pensions in 2024, restored the scheme’s name to NTR Bharosa Pension Scheme and paid the enhanced ordinary pension from April 1, 2024, with arrears. The government order records ordinary pensions rising from ₹3,000 to ₹4,000, disability pensions from ₹3,000 to ₹6,000 and fully disabled persons’ pensions from ₹5,000 to ₹15,000. The paperwork, at least, arrived with numbers attached. [citation]
The political fight is over what happened next. YSRCP general secretary Gadikota Srikanth Reddy has alleged that beneficiaries fell from 69 lakh by nearly six lakh, along with other claims about welfare delivery. That 69-lakh baseline has not been established in the available record. The strongest documented earlier figure is 66.34 lakh, cited in April 2024. A ministerial statement put the current distribution at 63.27 lakh in April 2025; a December 2025 disbursement report recorded 63.12 lakh listed beneficiaries and 58.81 lakh pensions actually paid. These figures may not measure the same thing, so the exact change remains unclear. [citation]
The Andhra government has not publicly answered the specific questions on removals, doorstep delivery or fresh applications in the material reviewed. Before claiming a six-lakh collapse, it should publish the monthly beneficiary series and define “beneficiary”. Until then, the allegation has a headline but no baseline.