Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge on Thursday asserted that Prime Minister Narendra Modi-led government at the Centre has cheated Maa Ganga in the name of cleaning the river under Namami Gange Programme.
The remarks came on a day Modi performed puja at the winter seat of Maa Ganga in Uttarakhand’s Mukhwa.
Taking a jibe at the Prime Minister, the Congress chief said, “Modi ji said that Maa Ganga called him but the truth is that he has forgotten his guarantee of cleaning Ganga.”
Referring to the Namami Gange Programme, he said, “Nearly 11 years ago in 2014, Namami Gange Programme was launched. A fund of Rs 42,500 crore was to be used by March 2026 under the scheme. But, the answers given in Parliament show that only Rs 19,271 crore have been sent till December 2024. That is, the Modi government has not spent 55 per cent of the funds of the scheme.”
Kharge also posed a question to the ruling dispensation over the matter.
“Why so much indifference towards Maa Ganga ?,” he questioned.
Claiming that in 2015, the Prime Minister had urged to contribute to the Clean Ganga Fund, the Congress chief said, “Rs 876 crore have been donated to this fund till March 2024, but 56.7 per cent of it has not been used yet. 53 per cent of this fund has been donated by government undertakings.”
Kharge, who is also the Leader of Opposition in Rajya Sabha further said, “A November 2024 Rajya Sabha reply shows that 38 per cent of Namami Gange projects are still pending. 82 per cent of the total allocated funds were to be spent to build sewage treatment plants (STPs). But 39 per cent of STPs are still not completed, and those that are completed are not even operational.”
Stating that Ganga is life-giving and it is India’s cultural and spiritual heritage, he said “but the Modi government has only cheated Maa Ganga in the name of cleaning it.”