The Kolkata Municipal Corporation (KMC) has in its budget for 2022-23 fiscal year, allocated Rs 24.10 crore to its social welfare and urban poverty alleviation (SW&UP) department, under which, as part of the Ma Kitchen scheme in Kolkata, more than six lakh poor people were fed as of January 26.

Official figures said a total of 6,08,519 plates were catered to, from 123 distribution centres of Ma Canteens in Kolkata”. The scheme was inaugurated by chief minister Mamata Banerjee in 2021 as she felt the need to introduce meals at a subsidised rate for the poor, many of whom were forced to go without food during the pandemic. She was, however, accused of emulating CPM-led Sramajibi Canteen, a community kitchen also for the poor.

The Ma Kitchen, the KMC budget read, was introduced in February 2021 to provide cooked meals at Rs 5 per meal to the poor and needy citizens. Governor Jagdeep Dhankhar recently sought information on the expenditure of the state government on this scheme.

He had said that then state finance minister Amit Mitra made a budget statement for the year 2021-22, where he announced the “common kitchen under Ma scheme that aims to provide two square meals a day to poor people at a subsidized rate. For this, Dr Mitra had announced a sum of Rs 100 crore, allocated for the financial year 2021-22.

The governor said that he had learnt from the public domain that the scheme was implemented in mid-February 2021 and thus concluded that for about a month-and-a-half, prior to April 2021, the scheme was already functional and during this period there was no legitimate allocation to this effect.

Dhankhar reasoned that Article 204(3) states that: “Subject to the provisions of Article 205 and Article 206, no money shall be withdrawn from the consolidated fund of the state except under appropriation made by law passed in accordance with the provisions of this article.”

Meanwhile, mayor Firhad Hakim has snubbed the central government, alleging that due to different intricacies associated with the central government’s revised guidelines relating to National Urban Livelihood Mission (NULM), training institutes have reduced in number and no new institutes could be enlisted by the KMC. He also complained there is no provision for the distribution of tool kits in the centre’s scheme and hence KMC provided 3,030 sewing machines and 950 beautician kits to the beneficiaries so they can earn their livelihood.