Mumbai: The State government’s celebrations marking the completion of three years in office were marred by photos showing BJP leaders facing scam allegations, released on social media, as the ‘real’ beneficiaries of government schemes. The government had released photos of scheme beneficiaries under the tagline mi labharthi (I am a beneficiary).
On Friday, social media was abuzz with the coordinated release of photos depicting BJP ministers Prakash Mehta, Pankaja Munde, Vinod Tawde, rebel Congress leader Narayan Rane and Sena leader Subhash Desai as the ‘real’ beneficiaries.
The NCP’s Chitra Wagh first shared the images on Twitter. She was soon followed by NCP MP Supriya Sule and other senior party members.
The pictures went viral first on WhatsApp and later on Twitter. A senior State Publicity Department officer said the government was aware of the images doing the rounds. “No political party has claimed the photos were circulated by them. I think it is a political issue, and administration should be kept out of it,” he said.
Congress spokesperson Sachin Sawant said, “In the photos released by the government, a road from Bangkok has been depicted as being in Maharashtra. It seems just like in Gujarat and Madhya Pradesh, ‘ vikas ’ has gone crazy here as well. The government is suffering from a disease called pathological lying. It has been using fancy taglines to prove that it has worked for the people. It is hell-bent on spending government money on advertising rather than on actual work.”
