Kolkata, May 11 (IANS) During the first meeting of the newly formed West Bengal cabinet, presided over by Chief Minister Suvendu Adhikari on Monday, a significant decision was made to allocate land for the installation of barbed fencing at the currently unfenced international border with Bangladesh to the Border Security Force (BSF), within a period of 45 days. Announcing this after the cabinet meeting, CM Adhikari said the promise to hand over land to the BSF within 45 days for the formation of the new cabinet was made in the BJP’s pre-election Sankalp Patra (election manifesto) and also announced by Union Home Minister Amit Shah.“So in the first meeting of the new cabinet today, that decision had been cleared,” Adhikari told media persons after the cabinet meeting.The second important decision cleared in the first meeting of the new cabinet was the implementation of the Ayushman Bharat, the centrally-sponsored health insurance scheme, in West Bengal. This was not implemented by the previous Mamata Banerjee-led Trinamool Congress government on the grounds that the Central scheme was redundant because of the implementation of the state’s own health insurance scheme, 'Swastha Sathi'.

CM Adhikari said the decision was taken at the cabinet meeting to start the process of involving the state in several other Centrally-sponsored schemes, including Pradhan Mantri Jan Arogya Yojana, Pradhan Mantri Krishak Bima Yojana, PM Shree, Vishwakarma, Beti Bachao Beti Padhao, and Ujjwala Yojana.“The District Magistrates have been instructed to send all applications to the Central Ministry at the earliest,” the Chief Minister said.Speaking to the media persons, he also assured that none of the existing welfare schemes, introduced during the tenure of the previous government, would be stopped.“Not a single ongoing social project will be stopped. However, non-Indians or deceased persons will not be allowed to get the benefits of these projects. This should not happen,” CM Adhikari said.

At the same time, he added, with effect from Monday, West Bengal has been linked to the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS), 2023 and Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita (BNSS), 2023.“The previous Acts, like the Indian Penal Code (IPC) and Code of Criminal Procedure (CrPC), were being implemented in a very illegal manner in the state for so long. From today, West Bengal has been linked entirely with the BNS and BNSS,” the Chief Minister said.He said in the cabinet meeting that a decision has also been taken to increase the upper age limit for applying to state government jobs by five years.“Before the recently concluded West Bengal Assembly elections, our Union Home Minister said that for the last 15 years, there has not been any fresh state government recruitment. So many educated youths have crossed the upper age limit for applying for state government jobs. So, we have decided to increase the upper age limit by five years to provide scope for such people to apply for jobs,” CM Adhikari said.  

/IANS