‘No funds dispatched by Centre for Bengal’s Samagra Shiksha Mission’

MP, 29 March 2024, Kolkata: The Centre has not dispatched funds to the tune of Rs 1000 crore for Bengal under Samagra Shiksha Mission (SSM) with the 2023-24 financial year coming to an end on Sunday. State Higher Education minister Bratya Basu has referred to the non-release of funds as another glaring example of financial deprivation for Bengal. “The move by the Centre is illegal, undemocratic and arbitrary. How can they stop funds even after the Ministry of Finance and Internal Finance Division of Ministry of Education has cleared the release of the funds which happens to be the third installment? The funds have been stopped for political reasons,” Basu said. Also Read - ‘Lakshmir Bhandar’ to be at forefront of TMC’s door-to-door poll campaigns The minister on his X handle wrote that the unstated reason for this deprivation is because the state government has not signed MoU (Memorandum of Understanding) with the Union government on ‘PM Shri’. “It is completely unethical and illegal to link the release of fund of one scheme with a separate scheme. Moreover why should a scheme be named PM Shri when the state is bearing 40 percent of the share.? # petty politics! #,” the minister wrote in his X handle. The minister and the state’s chief secretary wrote to the Centre for release of SSM funds but there has been no response. The principal secretary of the Education department Manish Jain and another senior official had personally visited asking for the due funds but nothing happened. In this financial year, the Centre has released only Rs 311 crore in two instalments in connection with SSM for Bengal. Sources said the Narendra Modi government wants to come up with 14500 Central schools across the country naming them as ‘PM Shri’. Bengal is one of the three states, apart from Odisha and Tamil Nadu, that have not signed MoU for this programme. https://www.millenniumpost.in/bengal/no-funds-dispatched-by-centre-for-bengals-samagra-shiksha-mission-557861