Context:

• Assam Chief Minister launched the PRANAM Commission, which is a panel set up to look after the issues concerning a Bill brought in for the protection of parents of state government employees. The Parents Responsibility and Norms for Accountability and Monitoring (PRANAM) Bill, stated to be the first-of-its-kind bill in the country, aims to protect elderly parents of government employees in their times of need.

Objective of the Commission:

• The bill aims to ensure that no state government employee ignores their elderly parents and unmarried differently-abled siblings.
• It is an effort from the state government to protect the parents and give them financial security.

Key Features:

• The PRANAM Billmakes it mandatory for the state government employees to look after their parents and unmarried differently-abled siblings who do not have their own sources of income. Under the bill’s provisions, if the PRANAM Commission gets a complaint that parents of a state government employee are being ignored, then 10 or 15 per cent of the employee’s salary will be deducted by the government and paid to the parents or differently-abled siblings. The bill would benefit 8 lakh parents of 4 lakh state government employees. The employees of private companies and the central government working in the state would also be covered by the bill at a later stage.