National helpline for senior citizens, Elder Line-14567, celebrated its second anniversary with a programme at its office, CK Arcade complex, here on Thursday with Dr. Tseilhoutuo Rhütso, MLA as the special guest.
Speaking at the programme, Dr. Rhütso, said he was privileged to be part of a movement that was focused at helping senior citizens.
He thanked the Good Samaritan Women Society, Department of Social Welfare Nagaland and Ministry of Social Justice & Empowerment, National Institute of Social Defence for helping implementing Elder Line.
Dr. Rhütso urged the younger folks working at the helpline centre and also members of the society to help in building a robust system for the elderly persons.
“Remember, if you help the build a good system to take care of the elderly, then you are helping yourself because we are all heading towards that stage physically where we will rely on others for support,” the MLA said.
He pointed out that helping the helpline to function effectively would only result in having a secure system for the future as the younger folks grow older themselves.
He observed that often there were instances where the elderly people were not looked after properly.
Taking note of the lesser number of SOS calls from the state, Dr. Rhütso said the reason behind that would be because Naga children consider looking after their aged parents and grandparents as a moral duty and something that should not be neglected.
However, he speculated that as the society marches ahead towards urbanisation, more cases of the elderly being neglected could prop up. He announced that Kohima town would try to come up with exclusive spaces for the elderly like a library, sitting area etc where the section of the population could spend time with each other in their leisure time. In this regard, he urged for the support of the people.
Dr Rhütso later unveiled the souvenir of Elder Line titled, “Footprint” during the programme.
While chairing the event, program manager of Elder Line, Neithonuo Liegise, highlighted about the helpline shared on the hardships and problems faced especially in the form of lack of resources even for the salary of the employees.
She said the employees have not received their salaries for the past several months and were functioning at the bare minimum as they had to downsize because of financial constraints.
Liegise pointed out that since there were not much calls in Nagaland, the ministry was unsatisfied with the performance of the State.
However, since the case in Nagaland was different than elsewhere in the country, she hoped that the standard operating procedure (SOP) would be remodelled and make it suitable for the state as well.
Liegise shared some of the achievement of Elderline in the past year including, help set up a separate counter for senior citizens at banks and free travel in NST buses.
Invocation for the event was offered by senior citizen, Abeni TCK while connect centre leader, Elder Line Nagaland, Kevitsonuo delivered the welcome address. Elderly speech was made by vice president, Senior Citizens Association Nagaland (SCAN) and vote of thanks was proposed by call officer, Elder Line, Nichuya.