'After Sharda, Coal...they did a scam in scheme named after Mahatma Gandhi': BJP hits out at TMC amid Delhi protest

As TMC leaders gathered in the national capital to protest against the alleged withholding of funds by the Centre, Union Minister Anurag Thakur on Monday hit out at Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee-led West Bengal government saying that they also did a scam in a scheme named after Mahatma Gandhi. This comes amid the Trinamool Congress backing a protest at Rajghat in the national capital to demand funds from the central government for the MGNREGA and other schemes. Addressing a press briefing, Union Minister Thakur said that to cover up the scams going on the ground, the West Bengal Chief Minister has sent her “corrupt” MPs to Delhi. The Union Minister said that the West Bengal government was involved in scams in the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act scheme. “A central team conducted a three-day enquiry (in Bengal) from January 22, 2019 to January 24, 2019, in six gram panchayats of Purba Bardhaman and in seven gram Panchayats of Hooghly. From here Rs 4.84 crore was recovered. Another Central team was constituted in 2021. This team went on 13 September 2021 and enquired till September 17, 2021. The observation by the team revealed that huge corruption was divided into small parts… Then the existing works were presented as new works… They also did a scam in a scheme named after Mahatma Gandhiji,” the Bharatiya Janata Party MP said. “They showed as new old lakes and roads, which were already built in Malda district…A lot of such illegal works were shown…The Centre then asked the state to take appropriate action in the matter and asked for an Action Taken Report, but they did nothing,” he added. Thakur said that there have been many scams in Mamata Banerjee’s government, like the Narada scam, Saradha scam, Rose Valley scam, coal scam etc. “Despite this, scams have also been done in MNREGA, a scheme run for the poor,” he added. The Union Minister said, “Their (TMC) corrupt government duped the poor of their money under MGNREGA and allotted houses in the name of those who already had houses.” “They didn’t stop here…They did corruption in houses for the poor. They allotted houses to those who already had multi-storeyed houses. After Independence, it was only PM Modi’s government that made 4 crore ‘pucca’ houses for the poor… But the TMC government, their officers, and leaders grabbed the poor people’s rights. I want to ask Mamata Banerjee why the three-storey house owners’ names were in the PM Awas Yojana. Why were the eligible people kept out of it?… I want to ask Mamata Didi - why didn’t you take action when you were asked by the Centre…Where was the cut money going?… PM Modi has given 4 times more money to West Bengal than the UPA government,” Thakur added. The Mamata Banerjee-led Trinamool Congress had decided to hold a protest in the national capital against the alleged denial of MGNREGA and other housing scheme funds by the central government to the state. TMC’s Abhishek Banerjee, who joined the protest in the national capital on Monday, will likely skip the Tuesday summon issued to him by the Enforcement Directorate (ED) in connection with the school teachers’ recruitment case. The Trinamool Congress leaders sat on protest at Rajghat with placards reading ‘Release Bengal Funds Now’, ‘Bengal deprived 1 lakh 15 thousand crore families, Rs 15,000 crore owed’. On Tuesday too, the TMC workers are likely to hold a protest against the central government for what it claimed was the centre’s failure in disbursement of funds to the state for MGNREGA, AWAS Yojana and other central government schemes.