Chief minister Suvendu Adhikari on Tuesday made it clear that there would be no automatic migration of the beneficiaries of Lakshmir Bhandar into Annapurna
Yojana.
The state government will release an application form on Wednesday, which women will need to fill out to be included as beneficiaries of the new scheme.
“Agnimitra Paul, the minister of the department concerned (women and child development and social welfare) and I will release a form for Annapurna Yojana. This form has to be filled out to get the benefits of Annapurna Yojana. Once the forms are filled out, the beneficiaries of Lakshmir Bhandar will be transferred into the new scheme. Until the transition is not done, the Lakshmir Bhandar scheme will continue,” said Suvendu after an administrative review meeting in Kalyani in Nadia on Tuesday.
Sources in the state administration said that the new government had earlier announced to bring all the Lakshmir Bhandar beneficiaries, except those who figured in the list of absent, shifted, dead and duplicate (ASDD) voters during the special intensive revision of poll rolls before the Assembly elections.
“The government had ordered a door-to-door survey to identify the ineligible and bogus beneficiaries of Lakshmir Bhandar. But it was found that there were more ineligible beneficiaries over and above the ASDD list. This is the reason why it was decided to publish the forms to get the names of eligible beneficiaries of the scheme,” said an official.
As of now, a total of 2.21 crore women aged between 25 and 60 years get the Lakshmir Bhandar dole — ₹1,500 a month for the general category and ₹1,700 for the
SC/ST category.
“You will get to know about the details of the forms tomorrow. Both online and offline facilities will be made available for filling in the forms,” said the chief minister.
Annapurna Bhandar, promised by the BJP in the run-up to the elections to counter Lakshmir Bhandar, will offer ₹3,000 a month to all eligible women.
A section of the officials said that the BJP-led state government was very serious on selecting genuine beneficiaries in all the government welfare schemes as it felt that ineligible beneficiaries would leave additional burden on the struggling state exchequer.
“The previous government did not screen the applications before giving out doles as it felt it would strengthen its vote bank. But the new government is serious about screening the list of beneficiaries to ensure that no ineligible person gets the benefit,” said a source.
The new government will also screen the list of beneficiaries of Banglar Bari scheme as it is believed that many ineligible persons were given ₹1.20 lakh each from the state exchequer to construct dwelling units.
The previous Trinamool Congress-led state government had started giving ₹1.20 lakh each to nearly 28 lakh rural poor to construct dwelling units from the state exchequer in two phases after the Centre froze funds under the Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana (PMAY), citing misappropriation.
“In the first phase, the previous state government had spent ₹14,400 crore to give ₹1.20 lakh each to 12 lakh beneficiaries. It had prepared a list of 16 lakh beneficiaries to give out the funds in the second phase, but the funds could not be released before the polls,” said a source.
The state panchayat department has asked district officials to find out ineligible persons who received housing funds. “It is yet to be decided whether an ineligible person will be asked to refund the money or whether any legal action will be taken against him or her. But it is being done to ensure that such irregularities don’t recur,” said an official.