After the initial survey of the Asian Development Bank pilot project, its second inaugural program was recently held at the Kegalle District Secretariat Auditorium under the leadership of Mrs. Kusum Bandara, Kegalle District Samurdhi Director.

 The purpose of the department was going beyond the scope of responsibilities assigned to the Samurdhi Development Department, as a pilot project of the Aswasuma program recently implemented and among those beneficiaries, 50 family units were selected from a domain representing 4 divisional secretaries of the district and 32 families were selected from those family units through the computer system and the empowerment of those family units. 1250 families are going to be selected covering 25 domains as 5 domains each from Warakapola, Deraniyagala, Yatianthota divisional divisions and 10 domains from Rambukkana divisional secretariat division.

The Ministry of Prosperity is working to contribute to the family units selected for the empowerment program and the survey work of the first phase has been completed by now. The data on the family units selected according to the above criteria covering 4 Divisional Secretariat Divisions has been computerized and among those 50 family units, 32 empowerment families will be selected using the computerized data system. It is under the direct supervision of a representative officer of the district secretary, the district welfare director, the representative officers of the divisional secretaries of division 4, the officers of the head office of the welfare department and the welfare management officers of the divisional secretaries.

Here, among the several projects implemented through the World Bank and the Asian Development Bank, the Empowerment Program, which is one of the pilot projects, Kegalle District is the first among the 13 districts of the island to complete the preliminary survey work. The Asian Development Bank, the World Bank, Japan Aid as well as the Samurdhi Banking System are providing support to this process and the project is being implemented through the Samurdhi Department.

The second phase of this pilot project should be implemented and completed at the divisional level within the two years of 2024/25. This project started from July 1, 2024 and is scheduled to end on May 31, 2026.

Explaining the purpose, the District Director of Samurdhi commented: "The Samurdhi Development Officers who have shouldered the burden of successfully completing this basic survey work in a difficult time frame, in a very short time in the difficult divisional secretariats, have worked together with dedication to make this survey successful. She further said that she would like to thank all the government officials who have shouldered this task and the thing that should be mentioned is that even the officials of the Asian Development Bank have been praised by those officials.

After the preliminary survey, the information about the selected family units from the respective domains of the respective Divisional Secretariats was also handed over to the Samurdhi Development Officers today. This program was organized today with the aim of providing awareness about this program and providing training to Samurdhi Development Officers.

Here, two resource persons with good practice in the scope were involved for this purpose and it is remarkable that Mr. Neville Wisidagama, representative of Asian Development Bank and Mr. Sunil Weerasinghe, Senior Manager of Samurdhi Development Department informed Samurdhi Development officials. Samurdhi Management Officers, Samurdhi Development Officers and Samurdhi Division Officers of the District Secretariat participated in this program which was a successful awareness workshop.