Asking people not to get carried away by the BJP’s false campaign against guarantee schemes, Dakshina Kannada District Congress Committee president K. Harish Kumar on Tuesday (June 16) said the government is trying to revise the list of beneficiaries for Gruha Jyothi, Shakti, Gruha Lakshmi, Anna Bhagya and Yuva Nidhi schemes. It is not stopping these schemes, he stated.

Addressing reporters at the district Congress party office in Mangaluru, Mr. Kumar said the government has to weed out “ghost” beneficiaries of Gruha Lakshmi, who continue to receive ₹2,000 every month in their bank accounts even after their deaths. The deceased beneficiary should be removed and the next woman head of the family should get the amount, he said, adding that the government should also remove women who receive the amount despite being income tax/GST payers.

“Removal of deceased beneficiaries and income tax payers is part of the ongoing process of revision of beneficiaries. The BJP is wrongly projecting it as a process to stop the guarantee schemes. Chief Minister D.K. Shivakumar and his predecessor Siddaramaiah have clarified that the guarantee schemes will continue,” he said.

Convention

The Congress will hold a convention of the party’s booth-level agents (BLAs) participating in the ongoing Special Intensive Revision (SIR) exercise, in Mangaluru and four other places in the State. The Mangaluru convention will be held on June 23, with BLAs from Dakshina Kannada, Udupi, Shivamogga and Chikkamagaluru districts participating. Karnataka Pradesh Congress Committee president B.K. Hariprasad will attend. The venue is yet to be decided, Mr. Kumar said.

Former KPCC general secretary R. Padmaraj said the party was seriously working to ensure that all eligible voters were included in the SIR exercise.