PM’s maternity scheme severely underfunded: Sonia Gandhi

Congress Parliamentary Party (CPP) chairperson Sonia Gandhi on 26 March, Wednesday, said the government's flagship programme to provide maternity benefits to pregnant women is "severely underfunded," resulting in a drastic fall in entitlements to beneficiaries.

Raising the issue through a Zero Hour mention in the Rajya Sabha, she said the Pradhan Mantri Matru Vandana Yojana (PMMVY) has seen a drastic fall in the number of beneficiaries and asked the government why this was allowed to happen.

Gandhi also noted that the National Food Security Act (NFSA), passed by Parliament in September 2013 under the leadership of then prime minister Manmohan Singh, has been the foundation for the PM Garib Kalyan Yojana (PMGKY), which was launched during the Covid-19 pandemic to provide foodgrain to poor families. The PMGKY currently has 81 crore beneficiaries.

Under NFSA, pregnant women were entitled to maternity benefits of Rs 6,000 per child, paid in two instalments.

PMMVY was launched in 2017 to fulfil this entitlement. But under PMMVY, only Rs 5,000 is given for the first child and the benefits are extended to the second child only if it is a girl.

"According to an informed analysis for 2022–23, about 68 per cent of pregnant women received at least one instalment of PMMVY for their first birth, but this number drastically dropped to 12 per cent (in) the following year. I would like to ask the Union government why this was allowed to happen," she asked.

She also questioned the provision for PMMVY not being separately mentioned in the Union Budget documents.

"The full implementation of the maternity benefits provision requires an annual budget of around Rs 12,000 crore. Surprisingly, the Budget documents do not contain separate information on allocations for PMMVY," she said.

All that the Budget documents reveal is that there is a programme called Samarthya in the ministry of women and child development. It has five components, of which PMMVY is one.

"The allocation in 2025–26 for Samarthya is only Rs 2,521 crore. This clearly shows that the PMMVY is severely underfunded, thereby violating the key provisions of the law passed by Parliament," she said.

This is the second time in the current sitting of the Rajya Sabha in the Budget Session that Gandhi has raised an issue. On 18 March, she raised a concern over the dilution of the employment guarantee under the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA).