Central govt ‘delinking’ Aadhaar cards of people in Bengal to deprive them of social benefits: Mamata Banerjee

In an apparent attack on the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)-led central government, West Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee on Sunday alleged that the Centre “deactivated" Aadhaar card of people in the state before the upcoming Lok Sabha polls so that they do not get the benefits of various social welfare schemes of her government through their bank accounts.

Banerjee also said that her government would continue paying the beneficiaries of the various state-run welfare schemes even if a person does not have an Aadhaar card. 

“Be aware, they (BJP-led Centre) are deactivating Aadhaar cards. Several Aadhaar cards have been deactivated in many districts of Bengal. They (BJP-led Centre) are delinking Aadhaar cards so that before polls people do not get benefits of Lakshmi Bhandar through banks, free ration," the chief minister said while speaking at a public distribution programme in Birbhum district. 

“But we will continue paying the beneficiaries of the schemes even if they have no Aadhaar card. Not a single beneficiary will be affected," she added. 

Referring to the agitation of the farmers in Haryana, Punjab demanding the government's guarantee on minimum support price (MSP) of their produce, Banerjee said that farmers in Bengal do not face any problem. 

“I salute farmers’ protest. I condemn the attacks on them," the West Bengal CM said. 

Alleging that several states were not getting their shares of the GST collected, Mamata on Saturday claimed that federalism in the country has been “totally bulldozed".

“If somebody says that secularism is bad, equality is unthinkable, democracy is dangerous and federal structure is a disaster, we cannot accept it," she said. 

Speaking at ‘The Telegraph’ national debate on ‘This house