Cash politics, development paradox

On January 3, 2026, a little-known Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader in West Bengal triggered a political row by asking husbands to “lock up their wives” who are beneficiaries of the Lakshmir Bhandar scheme to prevent them from voting for the Trinamool Congress during the elections.

The remark sparked outrage in the social and political circles of the State. The Trinamool Congress said it exposed the BJP’s “anti-women” mindset. The BJP State committee leader Kalipada Sengupta was made to apologise for his statement. Yet the controversy also brought renewed attention to Lakshmir Bhandar, one of the largest cash incentive schemes of the West Bengal government.

Announced by Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee in February 2021, just months before the Assembly elections, the scheme proved electorally transformative. By January 2025, it had reached 2.21 crore beneficiaries — nearly half of the State’s female population. Women aged 25 to 60 receive ₹1,000 per month under the general category and ₹1,200 under reserved categories.

The political impact has been unmistakable. The scheme has helped keep large sections of the women electorate firmly aligned with the Trinamool Congress despite serious incidents of violence against women — including the rape and murder of a doctor at Kolkata’s R.G Kar Medical College and Hospital in August 2025.

Data from the 2021 Assembly elections showed that nearly 50% of women voters backed the Trinamool, while only 37% voted for the BJP. The BJP leadership is acutely aware of this gender gap and of how cash incentive schemes help entrench it.

In December 2025, when Ms. Banerjee unveiled a report card titled ‘Unnayaner Panchali’ (The Song of Development), of her government’s performance over the past 14 years, Lakshmir Bhandar featured prominently. Comparing it with a one-time cash benefit of ₹10,000 announced in Bihar before elections, the Trinamool chairperson argued that her government delivers sustained annual support rather than pre-poll handouts.

“They (NDA in Bihar) gave ₹10,000 before the election, and there is a bulldozer raj now after the polls,” Ms. Banerjee said.

Cash-based welfare schemes catering to different social groups has become a defining feature of the Banerjee administration. By her own count, the State now runs 95 welfare schemes, with more promised in the next few months before elections are announced, taking the number of schemes well past three digits.

Even political opponents have tacitly acknowledged the impact of such schemes on the electorate. Union Home Minister Amit Shah recently assured voters in Kolkata that none of the Trinamool government’s welfare schemes would be discontinued if the BJP came to power.

While these cash incentive schemes may provide a political advantage to the ruling party, it is also important to understand their overall economic and social impact on the population. West Bengal’s multidimensional poverty rate stood at 11.89%, according to Multidimensional Poverty Index: A Progress Review 2023. Although poverty declined faster than in Gujarat, the State ranked only 13th nationally, behind populous States such as U.P. and Bihar.

Cash transfers may help households stay just above the poverty line, but they often fail to generate lasting structural change.

The State’s own Kanyashree scheme — designed to reduce child marriage through conditional cash transfers — illustrates this limitation. The scheme has about one crore beneficiaries on paper, but West Bengal continues to record highest number of child marriage almost a decade after the scheme was launched.

The latest Sample Registration System data shows that 6.3% of women in the State were married before the age of 18, compared to a national average of 2.1%.

There is little doubt that cash incentive schemes give Ms. Banerjee a decisive electoral edge. But while putting money directly into voters’ hands may shape political outcomes, it does not automatically translate into durable social transformation. Over the past few years, West Bengal has emerged as a case study of this development paradox.