Gold custody, armed security, and bullion logistics are not core competencies of a Health Department, a government doctors’ association has pointed out, questioning the administrative burden and cost involved in implementing the Thaimaman Thanga Mothiram Thittam in Tamil Nadu.

In a district-level costing of the proposed hub-and-spoke model, the Service Doctors and Post Graduates Association (SDPGA) said the hospital-based arrangement could cost roughly three times the State-wide administrative norm prescribed in the Government Order, factoring in the expenses for dedicated vaults, armed security posts, and armoured transport.

The association recommended that the scheme be delivered through a bank channel — either direct disbursal against a PICME (Pregnancy and Infant Cohort Monitoring and Evaluation)-linked entitlement certificate or bank-run logistics under a Memorandum of Understanding using the infrastructure that banks already operate for their own bullion, currency-chest, and cash-in-transit business.

According to the G.O., the State government had allocated ₹750.83 crore — ₹17,000 each for 4,41,667 deliveries — for procurement of one-gram gold rings. An administrative cost at 0.66% of the total budget — five crore — was sanctioned for the scheme. The administrative cost included monitoring, transport, evaluation, consumables, software, and hardware.

In a letter to the Health Secretary, SDPGA president P. Saminathan said the G.O. envisages a hub-and-spoke framework under which government hospitals take custody of, secure, and physically transport gold rings from hub centres to spoke delivery points for handing them over to beneficiaries. At the district level, the Health Department had to build a parallel bullion-security apparatus that had nothing to do with clinical care, he said.

Among the costs that need to be factored in are dedicated Reinforced Concrete Cement strong room with double locking, fire-rated vaults and dual-custody protocol at the two district hubs, biometric access and CCTV at 27 sites, six-member armed police/home guard posts each hub, additional security for every spoke and armoured cash-in-transit vehicles under annual rate contract with a driver and two escorts.

A district-level costing of this model involving two hubs and 25 spokes, and 25,000 deliveries per year, was worked out by SDPGA. It estimated an annualised capital cost of ₹12.68 lakh for strong-room and vault infrastructure at the two hubs, CCTV and biometric access at the hubs and spokes, steel safes/almirahs, besides a recurring annual cost of ₹71.50 lakh for security personnel, vehicles, insurance and digital systems. With the annual value of gold procurement estimated at ₹42.50 crore (25,000 rings x ₹17,000), the combined annualised cost of ₹84.18 lakh works out to 1.98% of the gold value, nearly three times the 0.66% administrative cost norm prescribed in the G.O.

By contrast, SDPGA said that using the existing infrastructure of scheduled banks could reduce the administrative cost to a negotiated handling fee. Even a service fee in the range of 0.15%-0.30% of the value handled (₹42.50 crore/year) would come roughly to ₹6.4 lakh to ₹12.75 lakh/year, thereby saving substantial funds and allowing health staff to focus on patient care. “The bank model is a foolproof time-tested model. Earlier, the Revenue Department implemented the Thalikku Thangam Scheme through a bank model, and the same can be brought in for the gold ring scheme,” he said.