Thousands of migrant workers who have returned to their home towns amid COVID-19, will be provided work under various government schemes for 125 days as part of the Garib Kalyan Rojgar Abhiyaan, Finance Minister Nirmala Sithraman said in a press conference on Thursday, 18 June.
The new Rs 50,000 crore public works scheme will be launched by PM Narendra Modi on 20 June 2020 in states like Bihar, Jharkhand, Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Odisha and Rajasthan.
“25 schemes of the government will be brought together and within 125 days, we will reach saturation level for each scheme. We want to frontload the money allotted to these 25 works to those 116 districts, some are aspirational and ensure shramik get employment for the next 4 months, using their man days to create assets. It could be various works like digging wells, laying roads, building panchayat buildings etc,” she said.
Earlier in May, the FM had announced a number of economic measures in light of COVID-19 including several categories of collateral free loans, raised investment limits for micro enterprises and relief measures for taxpayers and real estate as a part of the ‘Atmanirbhar Bharat Abhiyan’ package.
However, Opposition members had termed the relief measures ‘inadequate’.
Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Friday, 12 June, had announced that the maximum late fee for non-filing of monthly GST sales return for July 2017 to January 2020 has been capped at Rs 500, reported PTI.
(At The Quint, we are answerable only to our audience. Play an active role in shaping our journalism by becoming a member. Because the truth is worth it.)