Leader of Opposition Naveen Patnaik on Friday criticised the Mohan Charan Majhi government for allegedly misleading the women of Odisha over its much-talked-about Subhadra scheme.

Naveen alleged that the women of the state have been cheated by the Majhi government, which announced that it would give them ₹5,000 instead of ₹50,000 as promised during the election campaign.

According to the election manifesto, the BJP had promised that every woman would receive a ₹50,000 voucher, meant to be encashed over two years.

On Friday, chief minister Majhi announced the standard operating procedure (SOP) for implementing the Subhadra scheme. Under the scheme, all eligible women will be given ₹50,000 in five years. An amount of ₹10,000 will be credited to each beneficiary’s account in two instalments of ₹5,000 each, twice a year.

Naveen posted on X: “The BJP had given a guarantee to give ₹50,000 to each woman. But now they are paying only ₹5,000. They had said all women would be covered under this scheme. But now only one in three women would get the money. Is it the BJP’s guarantee to mothers?”

The former CM said: “It was expected that 2.25 crore women out of 4.5 crore people would be included in the programmes. But as per the BJP government, only 70 lakh women would be included. Then what’s the meaning of the BJP government’s inclusion of every woman in this scheme?”

Slamming the Majhi government, Naveen said women would get ₹5,000 in six months, which comes to around ₹800 per month. “How would this money help the women in their business? If they had received incentives of ₹50,000 as a whole, it would have certainly helped them.”

Naveen also accused the BJP government of borrowing ₹50,000 crore to implement Subhadra and other schemes. “It’s a debt burden on all of us...It’s not government money but borrowed money. Will it enable women’s empowerment?” Naveen asked.