State govt raises mediclaim amount for TV artistes, technicians

Kolkata: Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Thursday announced a hike in the amount of medical insurance for television artistes from Rs 1.5 lakh to Rs 2.5 lakh per year.

Banerjee was speaking at the Tele Academy awards 2017-18 held at Nazrul Mancha. She also proposed to incorporate the medical insurance schemes of the television artistes to Swasthya Sathi scheme. She also added that the construction of the proposed Tele Academy at Baruipur in South 24-Parganas would be completed within one year.

It may be mentioned here that after becoming the Chief Minister, Banerjee had taken up a series of initiatives for the well-being of the television artistes and other artistes from other fields as well. She had announced a medical insurance for the television artistes also.

"Television has become one of the most important medium now-a-days. Many TV serials have become so popular. A large number of people are involved in this profession. The artistes toil hard to bring out a serial. They often work till late night. We have decided to increase the medical insurance for the television artistes from Rs 1.5 lakh to 2.5 lakh per annum in addition to Rs 1 lakh accident benefit that they get," Banerjee announced. She also maintained that this health insurance scheme would be incorporated under the Swasthya Sathi scheme of the state government so that each individual television artiste can get a medical benefit up to Rs 5 lakh per annum.

The Chief Minister also distributed prizes among the artistes from various streams for their outstanding performance.

Ditipriya Rai who works with Karunamoyee Rani Rashmoni and Ishant Sadhuka working in Mahaprabhu Sri Chaitanya have been jointly adjudged the best child actors.

Somya Basu Roy has bagged a prize for his performance in a serial called Bandhan. Saswati Ghosh has received an award from the Chief Minister in the category of best story and screenplay in Karunamoyee Rani Rashmoni. Rohit Samanta has got a prize in the category of the best actor in negative role in Sanyasi Raja and June Malia has bagged the best actress in the negative role.