Welfare Sham
- Correspondent
- Jun 2
- 2 min read
The ‘Majhi LadkiBahin Yojana’ which involved a monthly handout of Rs. 1,500 to women between the ages of 21 and 65, had been touted as a game changer in the Mahayuti’s electoral strategy. But going by Deputy Chief Minister Ajit Pawar’s recent revelations, the scheme appears to be a cynical, haphazardly administered bribe disguised as welfare. Launched just weeks before the November 2024 state elections, the scheme was timed with precision but implemented with all the carelessness of a government more interested in votes than veracity. That the coalition swept to power, bagging 235 of 288 seats, is less a triumph of public policy than a testament to how brazen populism can pay political dividends.
Pawar has sheepishly admitted that thousands of ineligible beneficiaries, specifically government employees, were enrolled and paid under the scheme. Over Rs. 3.5 crore is being clawed back from some 2,652 women who never should have received a rupee. The scheme’s architects are blaming the election calendar for the mess, as if democracy and due diligence are incompatible. Pawar claimed that the ruling coalition did not have time to check the implementation, as though the sudden emergence of polling dates took everyone by surprise. It is an astonishing confession of negligence dressed up as inevitability.
Any policy that commits the public exchequer to recurring transfers must begin with rigour, verification and clarity. The errors, as lamely explained away by Pawar, were not unfortunate oversights but predictable outcomes of a politically expedient rollout. The only surprise is how quickly the scheme has begun to unravel.
What makes the situation worse is the government’s refusal to take responsibility. The Mahayuti, which won a thumping majority last year government piggybacking on this very scheme, now appears duplicitous. It is trying to have its cake, refund it and eat it too.
The moral hazard is enormous. Programmes like LadkiBahin are not inherently bad. Conditional cash transfers, if designed and executed with care, can lift women out of poverty, increase household autonomy and improve gender equity. But they cannot be tethered to electoral whims. When the purpose is electoral rather than economic, the state ends up subsidising corruption and inefficiency. Worse, it risks discrediting the very idea of targeted social support.
It appears that the Mahayuti had created a situation wherein authorities were pressured to disburse funds without scrutiny and the system bent under the weight of political urgency. This is electoral patronage on steroids. A flagship scheme that cannot distinguish between a daily wager and a salaried bureaucrat is certainly no triumph of women’s welfare. The Mahayuti may have secured votes in the short term, but its long-term legacy is likely to be one of waste and corruption.
If it is serious about women’s empowerment, the Mahayuti should re-engineer LadkiBahin with integrity. Else, it will remain what it already appears to be: a dressed-up dole wrapped in the language of sisterhood, but hollowed out by the politics of expediency.
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