TMC accuses Centre of ‘misleading’ Parliament, says Rs 52,000 cr in MGNREGA dues owed to WB

The Trinamool Congress (TMC) on Saturday accused the Union government of “misleading” Parliament on the status of MGNREGA payments and claimed that nearly Rs 52,000 crore in dues are owed to West Bengal under the flagship rural employment scheme.

Addressing a press conference in New Delhi, TMC deputy leaders in the Rajya Sabha and Lok Sabha, Sagarika Ghose and Satabdi Roy, said West Bengal had been among the top-performing states under MGNREGA until the Centre suspended funds in March 2022.

The Rural Development Ministry informed both Houses of Parliament this week that the state’s pending liabilities as of 8 March 2022 — when MGNREGA implementation was halted — amount to Rs 3,082.52 crore. According to the Ministry, this includes Rs 1,457.22 crore in wages, Rs 1,607.68 crore in material costs and Rs 17.62 crore in administrative expenditure.

The TMC, however, presented a sharply higher estimate. Ghose said dues for work already completed include Rs 3,700 crore under wages and Rs 3,200 crore under non-wage components. She added that the projected dues for the period in which MGNREGA remained suspended stand at Rs 28,400 crore (wages) and Rs 16,400 crore (materials and other components).

“Total projected dues are Rs 44,800 crore. Total MGNREGA funds owed to Bengal is Rs 51,700 crore,” she said. The party alleged that the Centre had turned a “legal right-to-work into a political weapon against Bengal’s rural people.”

In a written reply to TMC MP Derek O’Brien in the Rajya Sabha on Friday, Rural Development Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan said the Ministry was “reworking and refining” the necessary protocols to comply with the Calcutta High Court’s directive to resume the scheme in West Bengal.

Ghose criticised the phrasing as “linguistic gymnastics” and questioned the extended delay. She noted that the High Court directed implementation from 1 August, following which the Centre sought the Supreme Court’s intervention; the apex court declined to interfere in October. “It is now December, and the government needs to explain why the programme has not resumed,” she said.

The Ministry has maintained that MGNREGA was suspended in West Bengal from 9 March 2022 under Section 27 of the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act, 2005, citing the state’s “continued non-compliance” with Central directives.

The TMC leaders also accused Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman of misleading the Rajya Sabha during a debate on the Central Excise (Amendment) Bill, 2025. Sitharaman had said that 448 listed and 6,447 unlisted companies exited West Bengal between April 2011 and September 2025. In response, Ghose claimed that over 1 lakh companies were registered in the state during the same period, representing an 83 per cent increase, with 40,000 incorporated in the past five years. She has written to Rajya Sabha Chairman C.P. Radhakrishnan seeking expungement of the Minister’s remarks.

Ghose and Roy further expressed hope that a promised debate on the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls would be held in both Houses, saying the government must honour its commitment made in the business advisory committee meeting.

Responding to queries on suspended TMC MLA Humayun Kabir laying the foundation stone for a mosque in Murshidabad, Roy accused the Bharatiya Janata Party of “fanning communal fire” ahead of the West Bengal elections.