With a comprehensive approach to social development emphasising women’s welfare, the state government has decided to distribute smart phones to ASHA and Anganwadi workers in West Bengal allocating Rs 200 crore for the purpose.
The state finance minister Chandrima Bhattacharya yesterday tabled a Rs 3.89-lakh crore budget for the pre-poll financial year 2025-26. The ruling party’s last full-fledged budget before the 2026 assembly elections, laid a strong emphasis on social welfare and women empowerment. The budgetary outlay included substantial allocations in various sectors, with a focus on health and family welfare, initiatives for women and children, panchayat and rural department, school education, among other areas of development.
Of the key budget allocations for 2025-26, the state finance minister announced dedicated funds for providing smart phones to Accredited Social Health Activists (ASHA) and Anganwadi workers. As pointed out by the minister of state for state health and family welfare department during her budget speech, the ASHA and Anganwadi workers are important field level functionaries acting as a bridge between public health care delivery and local community. “They provide essential services related to mother and child health as well as promote important public health programs such as dengue control, controlling of non-communicable diseases like hypertension, diabetes, tuberculosis, cancer etc.” she said.
Aiming to enhance their capacity, the state government has now decided to provide smart phones to the two categories of workers. Under the initiative, 70,000 ASHA workers and more than one lakh Anganwadi workers are to be given smartphones for which the Trinamul Congress government-led by chief minister Mamata Banerjee has allocated Rs 200 crore in its pre-poll budget.
Last year, the state government increased the remunerations of ASHA and Anganwadi workers ahead of the Lok Sabha elections. The CM had announced a hike of Rs 750 per month raising the monthly pay to Rs 9,000 from the earlier amount of Rs 8,250.