Trinamul Congress Targets Central Deprivation in Upcoming Lok Sabha Elections

The Trinamul Congress's primary platform for the upcoming Lok Sabha elections will be the story of central deprivation, as Mamata Banerjee made clear on Friday. She held Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) accountable for the halt on the flow of funds to Bengal.

The chief minister said that the protest will go until mid-February in Calcutta and then spread to other regions of the state. The chief minister had earlier launched a 48-hour dharna against the Centre for what was seen to be its stepmotherly treatment of Bengal from a dais beside BR Ambedkar's monument on Red Road here.

While preparing the state budget audit report for 2020–21, she claimed that the CAG had created allegations against the Trinamul government by claiming that Bengal had delayed submitting usage certificates totaling Rs 2,29,099 crore that were issued to different departments between 2002–03 and 2020–21.

"I've informed the Prime Minister in writing that some facts have been misrepresented. I am not able to accept accountability for the government's actions since 2003 since Trinamul was not yet a year old. I have said that all usage certificates were filed between 2011 and 2021, the time we were in government. Additional allotments were provided since the Center was satisfied with the utilization certificates, the chief minister said.

According to Trinamul sources, Mamata had brought the matter to the Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) since it seemed that the Prime Minister had requested senior party MP Sudip Bandyopadhyay to review the CAG report after he had called Narendra Modi seeking to have the government dues cleared.

In spite of meeting with Modi and a team of party MPs on December 19, the chief minister chastised him for not moving forward to disburse the cash. cash for jobs, housing, and roads in rural regions are among the primary plans for which the state expects the flow of cash.

"I have never seen a government so full of retaliation.... I had three meetings with the Prime Minister over this matter. The last time around, it was determined that representatives from the federal and state governments would convene and resolve the matter. It has been two months since then. Why hadn't the monies been released yet? inquired of the prime minister.

Holding Modi accountable for the funding freeze, according to a source in Trinamul, was a political ploy to put pressure on the Prime Minister to reveal the truth via a statewide campaign.

During the election campaign, the chief minister said that repeating only two lines in Bengali would not be sufficient to win over the Bengali people.

"Where is the funding for the 100-day employment program? How come 11 lakh individuals whose names were approved last year still haven't been given homes? She enquired.

Mamata said that the state has performed well with its own revenues despite the Center's attempts to strangle it by withholding money under several schemes.

"People used to get 40 days of work on average year when money were provided under the 100 days employment initiative. However, this year, we used our money to provide 42 days of employment," the chief minister said, adding that it was illegal to halt the flow of funding since MGNREGA's constitutional need to provide work for the rural population was violated.

Reliable sources inside the state government said that Trinamul was deftly attempting to corner the federal government about the funding problem.

According to a source, "the CPM had secured electoral success by playing the victim card during the large part of its 34-year tenure in Bengal, particularly when Jyoti Basu was the chief minister."

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