Dr. A.H.M.H. Abayaratne, Hon. Minister of Public Administration, Provincial Councils and Local Government, supervised the Department of Pensions on 27.12.2024.
He fully supervised the various branches within the Department of Pensions, including Centralized, Decentralized, Widows and Orphans, Information Technology, Policy, Armed Services, Foreign Pensions, Contributions, Internal Audit, Accounts, Control, 1970 Short Call Service, and Archives. These branches implement the mechanisms developed by the Department to activate the pensions of officers from the Civil and Armed Services who retire from public service and to ensure the payment of benefits to them and their heirs.
By integrating the Pension Data Management System (PMS), several stages of the pension payment process have already been made available to pensioners online. The Minister expressed his gratitude to the Head of the Department, the Director General of Pensions, Mr. A. Jagath D. Dias, for leading the process, and to the officers working in the Department's head office and in Divisional Secretariats across the island for their contributions.
The Minister also approved the program to quickly launch several online projects planned by the Information Technology Division of the Department of Pensions, aimed at further streamlining and simplifying services for pensioners, including the payment of over 40,000 civil and widows' and orphans' pensions annually.
The Minister stated that the new government will focus on sustainably maintaining the pension system, which is the government's primary social security system, and on revising long-standing pension policies while formulating new ones to ensure its continued sustainability.
The Minister of Public Administration, Provincial Councils and Local Government, Dr. A.H.M.H. Abayaratne, the Secretary to the Ministry, Mr. Aloka Bandara, the Director General of Pensions, Mr. A. Jagath D. Dias, the Additional Director General of Pensions, Ms. Sujani Pettawadu, and other officials participated in this event.