Trinamul Congress today urged the Prime Minister Narendra Modi to publish a White Paper giving details of the payment made to the state government for construction of houses for rural poor (Awas Yojna) in 2021-22, 2022-23 and 2023-24 financial year.
Kunal Ghosh, Trinamul Congress leader alleged that the Centre had not paid a single penny in the past three years. “The Prime Minister is lying to confuse people. The Centre has spent crores of rupees to give advertisements in newspapers to confuse people by spreading lies. The PM has used the political platform to spread falsehood,” he said adding “The Centre is spending from its coffers to spread lies.”
He said the advertisement read that the Centre had approved construction of 4.49 lakh houses for the poor. He asked, “Where is the money? Approval and money released are not the same thing. The Centre should give transfer details of the money. They will never do this as they have not given money,” he maintained.
He said the state government wrote a letter to the PM on 14 December 2022 requesting him to release funds. The state government has prepared a list of 11.38 lakh poor people, whose houses have not been built. It has decided to set up their houses in batches, if the money is not paid by May.
He said more than 100 teams from the Centre had come to Bengal to identify fake job card holders under Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA) scheme. “They did not find any discrepancy. If for the sake of argument it is said they had found some discrepancy, then that money should be stopped pending inquiry but what about others,” he questioned, adding “UP tops the list of fake job cards, but their money has not been stopped.”
He urged people not to be swayed by the falsity spread by the BJP. “It is a political party that survives by spreading lies and lies only. Such lies from a Prime Minister is unheard of,” he said