TMC releases report card: 'We could not work at expected pace this year'

TMC in West Bengal released a report card on Thursday, highlighting its government's welfare policies and development projects. However, the part said that the pace of the development got decreased due to the ongoing coronavirus pandemic.

Kolkata: With an eye on 2021 Assembly polls, the ruling TMC in West Bengal released a report card on Thursday, highlighting its government's welfare policies and development projects over the last 10 years.

State Education minister Partha Chatterjee, who was present at the launch of ''TMC Report Card - Ten Years of Development, said the schemes floated by the Mamata Banerjee government in the last decade have benefited a huge section of people.

Chatterjee said party leaders would take the report card to the people of all 294 assembly constituencies of the state.

The TMC, after coming to power in 2011, has raised the allocation for the education sector to Rs 37,069 crore from Rs 13,872 crore, Chatterjee said.

"As part of the ''Sabujsathi'' scheme, 84 lakh cycles were distributed (to school students). Thirty new universities have come up in the state since 2010," he said.

Chatterjee said projects such as "Kanyashree" and "Sabujsathi" got universal acclaim.

He said 67.29 lakh girls were benefitted from "Kanyashree" is a cash transfer scheme aimed at retaining girls in schools and preventing their early marriage.

"An estimated 113 lakh students got midday meal while 95378 new classrooms came up in schools," he said.

"We could not work at the expected pace this year due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Our projects have improved lives of a large section of people in the past nine years," Chatterjee added.

The budgetary allocation for the power department rose from Rs 550 crore in 2010 to Rs 2,897 crore now "as we intend to supply electricity to 100 per cent population", Power minister Sobhandeb Chatterjee said.

Panchayat Minister Subrata Mukherjee said that under Bangla Awas Yojana, Rs 39,009 crore was spent by the TMC government for building 33.7 lakh rural housing units which is a record in the country.

He said under Khadya Sathi project, the food security of 9.5 crore people has been secured while 8.2 crore people are being given rice at a rate of Rs 2 kg and wheat at a rate of Rs 3 kg.

Firhad Hakim, who is the urban development minister, said 1.2 lakh unorganized workers have benefited from the state''s social security schemes during emergencies.

Lok Sabha MP Sudip Bandyopadhyay said he would like to call the report card a white paper on the "remarkable achievements of the state on various fronts" and stated that the number of factory units in the state has risen to 9,534 from 8,322 during the TMC rule.

Minister of State for Health Chandrima Bhattacharya said that 13.2 lakh people were treated under the state governments health insurance scheme with an expense of Rs 1,291 crore.

"We aim to bring 10 crore people under the Swasthya Sathi project," she said.

A brainchild of TMC's poll strategist Prashant Kishor hired by the party to strategise its poll campaign, the report card is a snippet of development projects taken up by the TMC government during its rule. It also seeks to counter the BJPs campaign about "misappropriation of funds and misgovernance" by the ruling party.

Elections to the 294-member Assembly in Bengal are likely to be held in April-May next year.

PTI