Centre has finally admitted it gave Bengal ‘zero’ NREGS funds: TMC MP

Tribune News Service

New Delhi, August 4
Citing an answer in the Rajya Sabha by the Centre to a question on the MGNREGS funds, Derek O’Brien, leader of the TMC in Rajya Sabha, on Sunday claimed that the government had in its response “finally” accepted that West Bengal had been given “zero” funds under the 100-day rural employment guarantee scheme.
TMC Lok Sabha MP Abhishek Banerjee has been demanding a white paper on the scheme to know what the Central Government had paid to West Bengal since the BJP’s loss to TMC in the 2021 state Assembly poll.
“Finally! Modi govt admits inside Parliament that Bengal’s been given zero for MNREGA funds,” O’Brien wrote on X, sharing the July 26 reply that gave state and UT-wise data of the last five financial years on the number of households that had completed 100 days of employment under the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MGNREGS).
In West Bengal, the number of households that completed 100 days of wage employment was “zero” in 2023-24, according to the written reply given by Union Minister of State for Rural Development Kamlesh Paswan in the Upper House of Parliament.
In 2022-23, 1,618 households got 100 days of work in the state under the scheme, while in 2021-22, the figure was 4,71,136, it was stated in the reply.
During 2020-21, the figure was 6,78,633, and in 2019-20, it was 3,65,683, it said. Officials in the Union Rural Development Ministry had earlier said the release of funds to West Bengal under the MGNREGS were stopped on March 9, 2022, due to “non-compliance with directions of the Centre”.
The action was taken according to the provisions under Section 27 of the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act, 2005, they had said. Overall in the country, around 44,99,343 households got 100 days of employment under the MGNREGS in 2023-24.