TURA: In a major milestone aimed at eradicating cash handouts and providing financial independence to beneficiaries, South West Garo Hills has become the first among the five Garo Hills districts to be recognised with the achievement of 100 per cent Direct Benefit Transfer (DBT) that ensures every job card holder of the MGNREGA project are paid their wages directly into their bank accounts.
To celebrate this accomplishment, a special programme was organised at Betasing multi-facility centre on Wednesday in which local MLA Miani D Shira and Commissioner and Secretary for Community and Rural development P Sampath Kumar took part alongside district officials.
“South West Garo Hills may be the youngest district in the state but it has achieved a milestone. This has been successful due to the hard work and united effort put in by everyone,” said Miani D Shira while addressing dozens of self help group members who attended the celebration.
Mentioning about the immense problems faced by beneficiaries, she recalled how people had to spend an entire day just to get a transaction done since there was only one branch of the State Bank of India in Ampati which was always packed with customers.
The Commissioner of Divisions for Garo Hills and C&RD Commissioner and Secretary, P Sampath Kumar while lauding South West Garo Hills for this achievement also added that it was doing immensely well in other fronts, particularly on the health sector where full immunisation of children has crossed over 90 per cent. “Earlier the central funds were around Rs 300 crore, but now we have touched Rs 1,200 crore. There is more money going to the villages and we need to save it,” he suggested. He announced that the government is going ahead with plans to ensure one woman in each rural household in the state is enlisted into a self help group (SHG) within a time frame of one month.
He also urged upon the BDOs to work out how two or three VECs can be converted to CSPs or mini banks so as to avoid the inconveniences faced by the villagers in going to the banks.
Out of the three blocks, Betasing was the first to achieve 100 percent DBT coverage, while Chipra Kama VEC, which has achieved DBT since December, 2017, was one of the three best VECs in the district.
