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News Desk: The West Bengal government has increased its expenditure on social welfare and development schemes by an additional Rs 8,700 crore, chief minister Mamata Banerjee announced on Monday afternoon.
“The government spent Rs 20,212 crore in 2020-21 on development expenditure apart from the beneficiary schemes. But after witnessing the demand for such schemes at the camps being held for the ‘duware sarkar’ (government at the doorstep) programme, we have decided to release an additional Rs 8,700 crore over the next one month,” Banerjee said at a press conference at the state secretariat.
The money, she said, will be allocated to various departments, ranging from panchayat to health.
In the last financial year, the total expenditure on beneficiary schemes was Rs 15,000 crore but in the current fiscal it has gone up to Rs 24,255 crore, she said.
Banerjee said, “The ‘duware sarkar’ programme, which started on December 1, will continue till January 25. In all, 20,000 camps will be held in four phases. It’s a new model in India and the world.”
“Senior bureaucrats, nodal officers and volunteers are working till midnight every day. Because of their hard work, 1.12 crore people have attended 11,056 camps till December 20. This is commendable,” said Banerjee.
“This is a unique project. For example, out of 7.14 lakh applications we received for the Khadya Sathi (food security) programme, 3.18 lakh people have already been included. For the Swasthya Sathi (healthcare programme) 27.13 lakh applications out of 42 lakh applications have been approved,” said the chief minister.
Similar work is being done to help people under schemes such as pension for farmers, pension for tribal people and stipend for the handicapped, girl students, sex workers, Anganwadi workers, folk artists and even members of the third gender and the LGBT community.
“The volunteers working at these camps will be also given a tiffin allowance of Rs 5,000 each for two months, in addition to a certificate of recognition,” announced the chief minister.
The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) was quick to react.
“The chief minister’s announcement made it clear that she treats people only as vote bank. The TMC government does not have a human face. It works only for political benefits,” said Samik Bhattacharya, chief spokesperson of the BJP state unit.
Bhattacharya also questioned the data dished out by the government, saying the statistics on the state’s healthcare scheme do not match with the ground reality one notices at hospitals.
“The state’s debt burden now stands at almost Rs 4,90,000 crore. That is something the next government will have to face,” said Bhattacharya,
“Duware sarkar will become a global model for its failure,” he quipped.
Governor Jagdeep Dhankhar too called a press conference and questioned the state government’s refusal to implement Central welfare schemes.
“In spite of writing letters to the government asking why are farmers in Bengal being deprived of the annual sum of Rs 8,000 that the Centre gives, the government didn’t reply,” said Dhankhar.
“After this, the chief minister wrote to the Union agriculture minister. I was shocked to read it. She wrote that this money should be given to the state government. Why should that be done when the beneficiaries are getting the money directly in their accounts across the country?” said Dhankhar.
Incidentally, Banerjee said that on Monday she wrote another letter to the Union agriculture minister making the same request. “The state is the implementing authority for all Central schemes. We will give this money to farmers. Why should the BJP reap political benefits?” she told reporters at the secretariat.
