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The BJP is all set to launch a campaign against Opposition-ruled states over alleged irregularities in the implementation of the Centre’s flagship schemes and its first stop is Kolkata, where Union Home Minister Amit Shah will address a rally on Wednesday to “expose the failures and corruption” of the Trinamool Congress (TMC)-led West Bengal government.
The Mamata Banerjee-led party has accused the Centre of not releasing Central funds to the state because of political reasons and held protests in Delhi and Kolkata in October. The Centre has said it will release funds to West Bengal under the MGNREGS rural job guarantee scheme and the Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana-Gramin (PMAY-G) once it is “satisfied” about “transparency” in the state. BJP leaders have accused the TMC of siphoning off MGNREGS funds and not submitting proper expenditure reports.
State BJP president Sukanta Majumdar told The Indian Express, “This is going to be a historic rally. The Home Minister will address it and the whole state will witness a saffron tsunami. This will be the launch of our election preparation ahead of the Lok Sabha polls.”
The focus of the rally in Kolkata’s Dharmatala area — the BJP had to approach the Calcutta High Court to get permission for the event after the Kolkata Police denied permission — will be the Narendra Modi-led government’s attempt to take on non-BJP-ruled states over Central schemes.
“We want to expose the failure and the laxity of the TMC government in the state in the implementation of central schemes. The TMC government has cheated the common public of the state and they have been deprived of the benefits of the central schemes, be it MGNREGS, Awas Yojana, or Jal Jeevan Mission. There is so much corruption also,” Majumdar said.
He added, “The Opposition parties are behaving as if the state they rule is not part of India. In their quest to target Modi ji and the BJP, they are slandering their states and depriving people of the pro-people programs of the Modi government. They want to create barriers between the people and the central schemes.”
The BJP’s Darjeeling MP Raju Bista told The Indian Express, “This meeting has been called in support of millions of people who have been deprived of their rights, and allocations provided by the Central government due to TMC leaders siphoning off these funds. In MGNREGA, over one crore fake job cards were created. Over 1.5 crore fake ration cards have been detected so far. Under the Har Ghar Jal scheme, the Central government has so far sanctioned Rs 57,103 crores but a majority of the funds have been diverted. Over 1.5 lakh Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana (PMAY) homes have been sanctioned in North Bengal but only a fraction have reached the deserving. Most of the houses have gone to TMC leaders, workers, and their families. Nearly 10,000 km of rural roads have been sanctioned in north Bengal under the PM Gram Sadak Yojana (PMGSY) but many of those roads only exist on paper and not on the ground.”
TMC spokesperson Kunal Ghosh said Shah’s rally would have no impact. “Whenever elections draw near, BJP leaders come to West Bengal to keep party workers in good humour. Before the 2021 state Assembly polls, they came to the state as daily passengers. They had given the slogan, ‘Ab ki baar 200 paar (Next time, over 200 seats)’. In reality, they were bowled out in Bengal. This time, too, such public meetings will not affect the people as they don’t have any support base here,” he said.
The TMC’s youth and students’ wings have said that on Wednesday they will publicise 51,000 letters written to Shah highlighting “rising unemployment in the country, struggling economic situation in India, and the Union government’s step-motherly attitude towards Bengal” and demand the “release of funds that have been withheld to exact political revenge”.
The BJP has created a new base of labharthis, or welfare beneficiaries, on whose support it has been dependent in elections since 2017-’18. PM Modi launched the Viksit Bharat Sankalp Yatra from Jharkhand on November 15 to showcase and celebrate the government’s “achievements of the last nine years”. This will help the BJP mobilise this group of supporters and ensure its continued dominance in national politics.
BJP leaders have claimed that the ever-growing loyal support base of labharathis, irrespective of caste differences, has propelled the party to victories in the 2019 Lok Sabha elections and important state polls. Before the last parliamentary elections, the party put the number of beneficiaries at 25 crore. The BJP received 22.9 core votes in that election. Modi has often emphasised the party cadre’s participation in implementing central schemes.
With the governments of states not ruled by the BJP announcing a series of welfare measures to gain an upper hand in electoral politics — from Karnataka and Rajasthan to Chhattisgarh and West Bengal — it has become imperative for the party to maintain its edge in the politics of welfarism. Though Modi has criticised the announcements of welfare benefits and guarantees by Opposition parties as “revdi culture”, the pulls and pressures of electoral politics have forced the BJP to keep up when it comes to welfare politics.
In recent months, the BJP-led Union government has accused the governments of some Opposition-rule states of renaming Central schemes and passing those off as their own. In February, Union Health Minister Mansukh Mandaviya warned the states on the floor of the Lok Sabha that the Centre would have no option but to consider the scheme “closed down” if the states continue to rename its Health and Wellness Centre scheme.
“With economic issues and welfare politics back on the electoral scene, the party has a big challenge to get the credit for the flagship schemes the Central government has launched. This will be a key part of our campaign in the run-up to the Lok Sabha elections,” said a senior BJP leader.
