"Naari Shakti" in Bengal Crying 'MNREGA' Tears After BJP Blocked Funds For 100-Day Work

“Baba (son) please come and see my house”, Shefali Malik, 50, pleaded before us as we visited Dakshin Jhapra village in Howrah district. She is one of the many women in the village who haven’t been paid their dues for their 100-day work under Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MNREGA). Shefali showed us around her broken one-room mud house. Her husband is 61 years old and paralyzed. “He has no senses, he can’t do anything. He stares blankly at everyone, helplessly. I have to take care of him. My only hope has been the 100-day work but they have not given me my money. How do I buy medicines for my husband, how do I keep him hungry? My one son is dead and another doesn’t take care of us. If that wasn’t enough, MNREGA has paralysed our lives”, lamented Shefali as her eyes turned moist.

Many women from the neighbourhood joined her, all of them held their job cards in their hands. They initially mistook us as government officials who could confirm their payment of dues and by when. But soon they broke down narrating their miseries non payment of the MNREGA remuneration guaranteed to all of them. According to Mamata Banerjee government more than 20 lakh people in the state have their payments for the 100-day work due in over two years. The state government maintains there are 2.65 crore beneficiaries who are directly affected due to blocking of MNREGA funds and the Central government owes around ₹7000 crore to Bengal under MNREGA alone.

“What has PM Modi done apart from asking us to submit this document and that document? From Aadhar to bank accounts, we have complied with everything but our money has not been released. Modi Ji says he gives guarantee go his promises, here our dues are compounding and that has guaranteed us suffering”, says Tanusree Malik. This Dakshin Jhapra village in Howrah is dominated by people from the scheduled caste community. They are now dependent on the free ration and other odd jobs for survival.

“Funds have been blocked because there has been gross mismanagement on the part of state government. Central teams have found irregularities. We have received complaints from the beneficiaries” said Dr Sukanta Majumdar, Bengal BJP President during a press conference in New Delhi as a counter to the massive protest led by TMC National General Secretary Abhishek Banerjee in the national capital. Demanding immediate release of central funds, Abhishek Banerjee and other TMC leaders along with affected beneficiaries have launched a protest on Mahatma Gandhi’s birth anniversary. Meanwhile, Union rural development minister Giriraj Singh announced on Monday that he will consider launching a CBI probe into the siphoning of MNREGA money, as being alleged by the Bengal BJP. “They have withheld the rightful dues because they want the people of Bengal to suffer. I challenge Giriraj Singh to prove corruption. And even if there is any irregularity at one place or two, which they have to prove, what merits withholding the money of the rest of the poor people? If CBI has to arrest anyone, Giriraj Singh should be arrested first. We will not buckle down,” said Abhishek Banerjee, TMC MP whose sit-in demonstration at Rajghat witnessed a scuffle after police forcefully removed the TMC leaders and minister from Rajghat.

“We don’t know who is speaking the truth. The State government is blaming the Centre and the Centre is alleging TMC has siphoned off money. For us, the truth is that we are suffering. I am old and yet I have carried mud and weight on my head. That’s what is called hunger pangs. How else do we survive? MNREGA meant dignity for the poor but we are robbed of our dignity,” said Soumali Malik, 57 years old, a widow, and a mother of two children.

Most of the women complained about cooking gas prices and how without any earnings from 100-day work they have gone back to traditional earthen chulhas, helplessly. “These days we eat only puffed rice. I am a mother and I can’t let my children die of hunger. But the only thing I can afford now is puffed rice. Even if there is free ration, we can’t cook because on a rainy day like this, the woodstock gets wet. How can I afford a cooking gas without any income from MNREGA”, asked Chobi Malik and recalled how payments would get cleared almost every year till last year and then things changed. It was pouring heavily as we were about to leave, an elderly woman came and with folded hands requested to send her picture to the Central government and let them know her story. She showed the leaks on the thatched roof of her house and how without any earnings, she has not been able to repair it in over six months now. “They say they worship ‘naari shakti’. I am a naari (woman) and a mother and look how I am living my life. The rains don’t stop for days and it meant I would be homeless, sleepless and without food for days. Why don’t they care for my Shakti and my life”, asked Bani Malik. She is 61 years old and she stays under the shade of a local club, at the mercy of other women in the neighbourhood who have ensured she too got some food if they could manage for themselves.