The Calcutta High Court ordered on Wednesday that only those Durga Puja clubs that submitted utilisation certificates for the grant, provided by the West Bengal government, would receive the amount this year.

The division bench of Justices Sujoy Paul and Smita Das De added that the state government must file a report regarding this year’s grant one month after the Puja holidays.

The report must contain details regarding the issuing of funds, filing of utilisation certificates on time, and verification of the certificates by the appropriate authority.

Last week, the Calcutta High Court began hearing two Public Interest Litigations (PILs) challenging the West Bengal government’s August 1 decision of increasing the annual Durga Puja grant to Rs 1.10 lakh, which is given to over 40,000 puja committees in the state.

One of the PILs was filed by Durgapur resident Sourav Dutta, who questioned how money from the state exchequer can be used for Durga Puja donations.

During Wednesday’s hearing, the Bengal government stated that out of all the clubs and puja committees in the state, only three clubs had not submitted utilisation certificates.

“There are 2,876 clubs that received government funds through the Kolkata police, and submitted the utilisation certificates. In districts where the amount was disbursed by the West Bengal Police, 41,799 received the grants, and of them 41,795 encashed it.  Later, 41,792 clubs submitted utilisation certificates. The three clubs that did not submit the certificate fall under the Siliguri Police Commissionerate,” advocate General Kishore Dutta informed the court.

Senior counsel for the petitioner, Bikash Ranjan Bhattacharya, informed the court that the utilisation certificates were submitted just two days ago after the High Court order.

“The utilisation certificates did not come in time. If the court’s order is followed, then this time over 10,000 clubs are not to receive the government grants,” he said.

The state government started providing financial assistance to the puja committees in 2018. In the first year, the grant was Rs 10,000.  In 2019, it was increased to Rs 25,000. After that, the amount continued to increase every year.

Last year, it was increased to Rs 85,000, and the government distributed more than Rs 350 crore to puja committees.

In 2022, the High Court imposed conditions on the Durga Puja grant, including a requirement for puja committees to submit utilisation certificates.

Earlier this month, Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee announced a 30 per cent hike in the grant to puja committees, which will cost the state exchequer

Rs 500 crore.

This year, the festival will be celebrated in the last week of September, and the Durga Puja Carnival will be held on October 5.