BADIN, June 2 Negligence and lack of interest on the part of postal staff has made the Benazir Bhutto Income Support Programme ineffective in the district.

Dawn on Tuesday learnt that thousands of people had applied for financial assistance which the government paid through the post offices at the rate of Rs3,000 per applicant.

A huge amount, it was revealed, either failed to reach the deserving people or was returned by the postal staff back to Hyderabad post office perhaps because of the unavailability of the person at the mentioned address.

Applicants stating their present addresses in application forms instead of the mentioned in the CNIC were wondering as how to rectify the oversight as postal staff had refused payments to around 15 per cent because of this discrepancy. These also include women folks.

Payments were released to Badin post office for Maryam, Aasiyat and four other women but they could not receive it the pretext of change in addresses as presently they were residing in Pir Malook Shah Mohalla Ward-4 Badin. The same had been returned to Hyderabad. However, these elderly ladies alleged that few like them received their payments after greasing the hands of agents.

Sakina of Malkani taluka Tando Bago said that she mentioned her present residential address but as the CNIC carried the address of Malkani she was made a rolling stone and was being shuttled between Badin and Malkani post offices by the officials concerned sans any payment, as yet.

Karima, Naimat and others have a different story to tell of the inefficiency of concerned people who now seek affidavits from them for not being present at the residences when post man came to deliver their dough. They said that each affidavit costs around Rs50 which they were unable to pay.