AAP backs tainted Vishwas, accuses media of 'twisting' story

New Delhi, May 9: The Trinamool Congress on Saturday responded to Union home minister Amit Shah’s charge that the Mamata Banerjee-led West Bengal government is not facilitating the movement of stranded migrant workers.

Amit Shah has written to West Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee, saying her government is doing “injustice” to migrant workers by not allowing the special Shramik trains to reach the state.

“Union home minister Amit Shah speaks after weeks of silence only to mislead people with lies,” the TMC’s Abhishek Banerjee was quoted as saying by news agency PTI.

“The Centre is lying… West Bengal is running 711 camps for migrants in the state. We are taking good care of them,” Abhishek Banerjee, who is also the chief minister’s nephew, said.

Amit Shah had pointed out in his letter that the Centre was not receiving the “expected support” from the state government in helping stranded migrant workers from West Bengal.

“West Bengal government is not allowing trains with migrants reaching the state. This is injustice with WB migrant labourers. This will create further hardship for them,” Amit Shah had said in his letter to Mamata Banerjee.

The issue of migrant workers is the latest flashpoint between the Centre and the West Bengal government amid a row over the state’s efforts to control the coronavirus disease (Covid-19).

The Centre and the state have exchanged allegations over the criteria for reporting deaths from the infection, and while While Bengal says the Centre is trying to politicise a public health crisis, the Union government maintains that state officials are ignoring repeated warnings to step up the fight against the disease.

Federal officials have said that the region has not conducted adequate tests and that there has been mismanagement over identifying hotspots and containing them.

Union home secretary Ajay Bhalla also slammed the state government for a very low rate of testing and high rate of mortality, 13.2%, by far the highest for any state.

The Centre has also accused the state government of not allowing cross-border movement of goods trucks to Bangladesh.

There are 1,678 Covid-19 cases and 160 deaths in West Bengal until Saturday morning.

Ahmedabad, Mar 24: The Gujarat police has detained 426 people in the last 24 hours for violating lockdown rules in force in the state to combat the novel coronavirus outbreak, a senior official said on Tuesday.

They include those who came out despite being advised home quarantine, state Director General of Police Shivanand Jha said.

"The lockdown met with around 90 per cent success. We are taking strict measures to implement the lockdown in the remaining 10-15 per cent areas. We have lodged 238 cases related to the violation of police notification and 127 cases related to quarantine rule violation. In all, we have detained 426 persons across the state," Jha told reporters in Gandhinagar.

"For better implementation of the lockdown and to address issues concerning people, we have set up a dedicated 24-hour control room and appointed two additional DGP rank officers to supervise operations. Three teams under them would work to resolve issues across the state," said Jha.

He said police commissioners and districts SPs have been asked to enforce the lockdown in an effective manner.

Essential services like vegetable and milk shops are allowed to remain open, he said, and asked people not to flock in large numbers to such shops.

The state has so far reported 33 COVID-19 cases, and one person has died of the infection.

New Delhi, June 8: Only 20.26 lakh migrant workers of the targeted 8 crore such labourers have received free food grains in May and June (2020), according to data released by the Ministry of Consumer Affairs, Food and Public Distribution.

In the middle of May, as part of the Rs 20 lakh crore Atma Nirbhar Bharat package, the Modi government had announced that migrant labourers who are not covered under the National Food Security Act (NFSA) or any state-run PDS scheme, will receive free food grains for two months.

"Non-card holders shall be given 5 kg wheat or rice per person and 1 kg chana per family per month for the next 2 months. About 8 crore migrants will benefit from this scheme that will cost the government Rs 3500 crore,” Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman had said at a press conference following PM Modi’s announcement.

But the Ministry of Consumer Affairs, Food and Public Distribution said on Sunday, "The states and UTs have lifted 4.42 LMT (lakh metric tonne) of food grains and distributed 10,131 MT of it to 20.26 lakh beneficiaries."

It added, "The Government of India also approved 39,000 MT pulses for 1.96 crore migrant families. Around 28,306 MT gram/dal have been dispatched to the states and UTs. A total 15,413 MT gram have been lifted by various states and UTs". The state governments, the ministry added, had distributed only 631MT (metric tonnes) of gram so far.

Because of the constant movement of migrant workers, the Centre had said that the states will be responsible for identifying the migrants and subsequent food distribution.

The Centre claims it is spending approximately Rs 3,109 crore for food grains and Rs 280 crores for grams/chana under this package.