West Bengal VOA: Yuba-Sathi debuts, social schemes get fund boost in poll year

KOLKATA: Banglar Yuba-Sathi, targeted at the state’s unemployed youth, joined the slew of social welfare schemes of the Mamata Banerjee regime on Thursday as state finance minister Chandrima Bhattacharya presented its last vote-on-account budget before the state assembly poll due in a few months.


The govt also enhanced the payout for Lakshmir Bhandar — the signature social welfare scheme introduced just before the 2021 assembly election, from Rs 1,000 to Rs 1,500 (with added benefits for Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes) — besides increasing by Rs 1,000 the monthly honorarium for ASHA and anganwadi workers, para-teachers and civic volunteers.

There was some good news for full-time state employees as well, who got a 4% hike in dearness allowance plus the promise of a Seventh Finance Commission. The pre-poll vote-on-account also renamed the Karmashree scheme “Mahatma-Shree” and hiked the minimum number of workdays from 75 to 100 in an overt nod to politics and Trinamool’s opposition to the Centre’s decision to rename the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme.


Thursday’s vote-on-account covered every section of society, CM Banerjee said after the session, adding that the number of social welfare schemes in Bengal had now crossed a century. “We had 94 projects earlier. We hit a century with the new projects,” she said, lauding the vote-on-account for being “pro-people” and showing fiscal discipline “unlike the directionless and rudderless” Union Budget.


Economist and BJP MLA Ashok Lahiri, however, criticised the vote-on-account for looking “more like the Trinamool manifesto” and said it failed to explain how the extra funds required for the enhanced DA would be met.


The highlight of the state’s last pre-poll interim financial statement was the addition of Banglar Yuba-Sathi to the existing social welfare schemes.


The Banglar Yuba-Sathi scheme will roll out on August 15 this year and promises a monthly assistance of Rs 1,500 to everyone between 21 and 40 years old who has passed Madhyamik but is unemployed .


and not covered by any other social security scheme other than educational benefits or scholarships; they will get this benefit till they get a job or up to five years, whichever is earlier. State finance minister Bhattacharya said Rs 5,000 crore had been kept for this for the 2026-’27 financial year.


The state’s signature Lakshmir Bhandar scheme, introduced five years ago, now benefits more than 2.2 crore women and will add 20 lakh more beneficiaries who will get the enhanced benefit of Rs 1,500.


All ASHA workers’ monthly honorarium has been hiked by Rs 1,000, besides which they will now get 180 days’ maternity leave; their next of kin will now get a one-time compensation of Rs 5 lakh if they die before 60. Bhattacharya’s vote-on-account gives similar benefits to anganwadi workers and helpers as well as para-teachers.