West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Monday announced a new financial scheme for migrants returning to the state in the wake of detention and deportation of Bengali-speaking people from different parts of the country, especially BJP-ruled states like Delhi, Haryana, and Maharashtra, on suspicion of them being illegal Bangladesh immigrants.
Under the scheme, named Sramosree, every migrant family would receive Rs 5000 per month for a year on their return.
The decision was taken at a Cabinet meeting, chaired by Chief Minister Banerjee.
Addressing the mediapersons after the Cabinet meeting, the chief minister said: “In the double-engine government states, Bengali migrant workers are being attacked in a planned manner. They are being detained, jailed, and even deported to Bangladesh. Our 22 lakh migrant workers work in other states. We have decided to stand by those who have been tortured and are returning to West Bengal without anything. We have decided to launch this scheme, Sramosree, for their rehabilitation.”
According to the chief minister, the state Labour Department will be the nodal body for implementing the scheme.
“We will start a portal on Sramosree, where migrant workers can apply for the benefits. They will also be given jobs under the Karmasree project,” the chief minister said, adding the returning migrant workers will be included in other schemes like Khadya-Sathi and Sasthya-Sathi.
In case the migrant worker gets a job within a year of their return, the CM said, the nodal body would then decide whether the monthly compensation could be continued or not.
There have been several cases of West Bengal migrant workers being detained in various states during verification drives carried out by the respective state authorities. Some were even pushed into Bangladesh from Assam, another BJP-ruled state. While some have been brought back from Bangladesh, families of several deported migrants have filed habeas corpus petitions in the High Court.
For the two months, the TMC and West Bengal chief minister have on several occasions hit out at the BJP for “exporting their anti-Bengal agenda to other parts of the country in a strategic and systemic manner.”
“Speaking Bengali does not make one a Bangladeshi. These individuals are as much citizens of India as anyone else, regardless of what language they speak. Having failed in their attempts to deprive Bengalis in West Bengal, the BJP is now exporting their Bangla-Birodhi (anti-Bengali) agenda to other parts of the country in a strategic and systemic manner… Disturbing reports have emerged from Delhi, Gujarat, Maharashtra, Odisha, and Madhya Pradesh, where Bengali-speaking individuals are facing targeted persecution,” the CM had said last July.