Vijay Wadettiwar has accused the Mahayuti government of dropping 92.10 lakh women from the Ladki Bahin scheme. The charge has sharpened questions over e-KYC verification, eligibility checks and political accountability.
Senior Congress leader Vijay Wadettiwar on Wednesday alleged that the BJP-led Mahayuti government in Maharashtra used women for electoral gains and then abandoned them after coming to power. He claimed that 92.10 lakh beneficiaries had been removed from the state government’s flagship Mukhyamantri Majhi Ladki Bahin Yojana.
In a post on X, the Congress Legislature Party leader said the number of beneficiaries had fallen from 2.48 crore to 1.65 crore after e-KYC and verification. The state government had earlier said the drop was mainly due to incomplete e-KYC and income criteria.
Wadettiwar said a whistleblower activist had highlighted the removal of 92.10 lakh beneficiaries from the scheme. He questioned the government’s handling of the verification process and alleged that poor women had been denied assistance while action had not been taken against those who were allegedly ineligible.
“Before the scheme was launched, the Directorate of Economics and Statistics had stated that around 2.47 crore women were eligible. If the government had identified ineligible beneficiaries, why has it not shown the courage to recover the money from families of government employees who allegedly received the benefits?” the Congress leader asked.
He claimed that 62 lakh beneficiaries were removed for non-compliance with e-KYC, 16 lakh for not meeting the income criteria, 4.42 lakh because they were government employees as declared in e-KYC, 2.5 lakh because more than two women in one household were receiving the benefit, 1.8 lakh because they were above 65 years of age, 1.7 lakh were deleted at the district level for not meeting the criteria, and 8,000 were found to be government employees.