Chief minister Mamata Banerjee patted her government for the developmental work done for the people of the state alongside blaming the Centre for their step motherly treatment with Bengal.
“The world today is appreciating the work that has been done by the Bengal government. The government of India, and various other organisations, have conferred numerous awards to the Bengal government,” she said. She added that the media should highlight the positive aspects of our government’s functioning.
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However, they won’t, as they have orders from the top. “Our social security schemes have performed the best across India. These schemes are very close to my heart, and I am proud of achieving success in this sector,” she added. Taking on the media for its ‘biased reporting’, she said, “I have also seen false news about Bengal remaining in debt. The issue is that the newer states, like Andhra Pradesh and Telangana, don’t have the issue of repaying loans.
Meanwhile, Bengal has a legacy of the erstwhile CPM government, which had taken various loans. Today, however, we have reduced these debts by leaps and bounds. Bengal’s ‘Debt to GDP Ratio’ in 2011 was 40 per cent. Today, we have brought it down to 33 per cent. In fact, before the Covid-19 pandemic, we had reduced our ‘Debt to GDP Ratio’ to 32 per cent. In terms of debt management, we have done remarkably well,” she said.
She later added, the Union government’s debt was Rs 62.42 lakh crore in 2014-15. Today, it stands at Rs 156.2 lakh crore. Centre keeps blaming our state, but has never said about its own debt ratio? Even after introducing so many social welfare schemes, our schemes are being shut down by the Centre. The central government is not paying money for the 100 days’ work scheme.
BJP leaders should know that MGNREGA is a guaranteed programme, but we are still awaiting Rs 7,000 crore under the scheme from the Centre. She reminded that under the PM Awas Yojana, the central government is not the only one that gives money, it is shared in 60:40 ratio with the state. While the state gives 40 per cent, Centre gives 60 per cent, but that money too, is our share of GST, which they take from Bengal. Centre’s vendetta is the reason why lakhs are awaiting houses in Bengal. For the Grameen Rasta scheme too, they haven’t paid us.
Despite that, from our end, we have built over 1 lakh km roads since 2011. Another 11,000 roads is being built under the Pathashree-Rastashree Scheme, she said
