SRINAGAR: More than 4.1 lakh applications under the Pradhan Mantri Matru Vandana Yojana (PMMVY) have been approved in Jammu and Kashmir since April 2023, while 3,534 eligible beneficiaries are yet to receive maternity benefits due to Aadhaar-related authentication and banking issues, the Union Government informed Parliament on Friday.
Replying to an unstarred question in the Lok Sabha, Minister of State for Women and Child Development Savitri Thakur said the PMMVY was migrated to a new paperless digital platform, PMMVYSoft, from April 1, 2023, to improve transparency, speed up approvals and minimise payment failures.
Official data showed that in Jammu and Kashmir, 14,793 applications were approved in 2023-24, 1,83,102 in 2024-25, 1,33,559 in 2025-26, and 56,717 applications had been approved during 2026-27 up to August 5, taking the total approvals since the new portal’s launch to 3,88,171. During the same period, the Union Territory received 4,34,543 applications, while 32,958 applications were rejected.
The government said 1,576 beneficiaries in Jammu and Kashmir have not received payments because their Aadhaar numbers are not mapped with the National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI), while another 1,958 beneficiaries are awaiting payments due to unsuccessful Aadhaar biometric authentication, taking the total number of pending Aadhaar-related payment cases to 3,534.
The ministry clarified that applications are rejected only when applicants are found ineligible under scheme guidelines, submit incorrect supporting documents, or have already availed the full benefit under the scheme. It stated that no separate year-wise data are maintained for Aadhaar-related pending cases because beneficiaries are removed from the list once authentication or bank mapping is completed.
The Centre said several reforms have been introduced to prevent eligible women from being excluded due to technical or digital issues. These include Aadhaar-based biometric verification using facial recognition, automatic verification of Aadhaar and Direct Benefit Transfer (DBT) details during registration, online application tracking, an integrated grievance redressal system, a multilingual toll-free helpline, SMS alerts at every stage of processing, and periodic registration drives through Anganwadi and ASHA workers.
The ministry added that PMMVY funds are now released through the Single Nodal Agency-SPARSH mechanism under the Public Financial Management System on a “just-in-time” basis. It said fund utilisation and application pendency are monitored regularly through video conferences with States and Union Territories, alongside a dedicated online portal for utilisation certificates and expenditure statements.
