Jharkhand Pradesh Congress Committee (JPCC) president Ajoy Kumar on Thursday charged State government of being indulged in organised loot of welfare funds in State. Sharing documents of government's alleged involvement of mobilizing welfare funds for the poor including pension, MGNREGA wages and others into either bogus accounts or in private banks, he demanded legal action against the Chief Secretary of the State in cases of certain hunger deaths in State.
Kumar said that the government had left no reason for the poor in State to remain alive, as they were being kept wandering from pillar to post even for their right to food and work and this all was happening on the name of development. He said that the party would organize statewide agitation on district headquarters and block offices on December 20 to seek answers from the government.
"All welfare programmes being run in State, in which Aadhaar seeding has been made mandatory even after the Supreme Court ruling out any such requirement for welfare programmes have been turned source of organised corruption by the government. We have come across funds of beneficiaries being directed to other bogus bank accounts even after Aadhaar seeding. Transferring beneficiary funds to ICICI Bank accounts and Airtel Payment Bank is just an example how government is supporting open loot of welfare funds," charged Kumar during press conference organised in party headquarters.
The party also demanded disclosure of all cancelled ration cards to make sure that they were not being used anyway. "There are hunger deaths and government is not ready to confess. The government itself claims of cancellation of over a million ration cards as it says they were not seeded with Aadhaar. But it is not ready to bring details of those ration cards in public domain which raises grave question of its misuse by the government and middlemen itself. Moreover, disallowing a poor of food grains or pension due to non-linkage of his/her Aadhaar with other documents is direct violation of clauses of the Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) and the CS must be booked for blocking ration of those having no Aadhaar in State," said Kumar.