Bhubaneswar: The Odisha government has been felicitated with the prestigious SKOCH Award for effective implementation of the Disaster Assistance Monitoring and Payment System (DAMPS).
DAMPS facilitates quick payment of ex-gratia to the next of kin of persons losing their lives in disasters and natural calamities. Designed and developed by the National Informatics Centre (NIC), DAMPS is a digital platform for online processing, monitoring and payment of ex-gratia to the kin of the disaster victims.
Additional Special Relief Commissioner Padmanav Behera and Deputy Secretary Biswanath Sahoo received the award on behalf of Additional Chief Secretary and Special Relief Commissioner Satyabrat Sahu at a function in New Delhi.
Speaking to mediapersons, Sahoo said the DAMPS project was the most aspirational project of Chief Secretary Pradeep Kumar Jena. Besides, he also gave credit to all stakeholders for the successful management of the project.
According to sources, DAMPS was introduced on June 10, 2020 so that the state government could provide the disaster assistance to the entitled citizens without any hassles.
Gone are the days when victims of natural calamities used to run from pillar to post to receive the ex-gratia amount from the government. The victims had file FIR and make the rounds of banks to get the ex-gratia for the loss caused by disasters. However, things have changed after the paperless digital platform DAMPS came into being.
Apart from timely release of ex-gratia amount, the platform has helped in relieving the burden on collectors, sub-collectors and tehsildars.
