Saugata Roy Allegations: Finance Minister Misleads on Bengal’s MGNREGA Dues

New Delhi [India], December 16 (ANI): Trinamool Congress (TMC) MP Saugata Roy accused the Union authorities of intentionally avoiding a dialogue on West Bengal whereas “repeatedly deceptive the Home” over pending dues below the Mahatma Gandhi Nationwide Rural Employment Assure Act (MGNREGA), triggering a coordinated walkout from Parliament by opposition events throughout the ongoing winter session on Monday.
“The Finance Minister (Nirmala Sitharaman) prevented talking on West Bengal as she knew that she can be challenged,” Roy informed reporters. “We walked out in protest, and the Congress and the Samajwadi Occasion additionally did the identical. The Union Finance Minister is repeatedly deceptive the Home on Bengal’s dues on the MGNREGA,” he mentioned.
Roy additionally responded to questions on the federal government’s transfer to introduce the Viksit Bharat-Assure for Rozgar and Ajeevika Mission (Gramin) Invoice, 2025, which seeks to interchange the present MGNREGA framework. On the proposed renaming of the flagship rural employment scheme, the TMC MP mentioned the social gathering would articulate its place as soon as the invoice is formally taken up. “We will communicate on that when the invoice comes up for consideration. The invoice might come up tomorrow, and solely then will we communicate,” he mentioned.
The federal government argues that the brand new invoice aligns rural employment and infrastructure creation with the broader Viksit Bharat 2047 imaginative and prescient. In line with official outlines, the proposed laws goals to give attention to empowerment, development, convergence and saturation to construct a resilient rural economic system. It proposes aggregating public works right into a Viksit Bharat Nationwide Rural Infrastructure Stack, prioritising water safety, core rural infrastructure, livelihood-linked initiatives, and climate-resilient initiatives.
A key characteristic of the invoice is the enhancement of assured wage employment from 100 days to 125 days per rural family. It additionally seeks to make sure ample availability of farm labour throughout peak agricultural seasons and mandates Viksit Gram Panchayat Plans for built-in, saturation-driven native planning. These plans are proposed to be linked with PM Gati Shakti by geospatial methods and digital public infrastructure.
The draft invoice additionally envisages a contemporary digital governance framework, incorporating biometric authentication, GPS- and mobile-based monitoring, real-time dashboards and the usage of Synthetic Intelligence instruments for planning, auditing and fraud threat mitigation.
Earlier, TMC MP Sagarika Ghose strongly criticised the transfer, calling the renaming of MGNREGA an “insult” to Mahatma Gandhi, Rabindranath Tagore and West Bengal, intensifying the political confrontation forward of the invoice’s introduction in Parliament. (ANI)