Union minister Sadhvi Niranjan Jyoti on Saturday asserted that the Centre has never deprived West Bengal of its MGNREGA dues and statistics of the last nine years prove that.

The Union Minister of State for Rural Development, who was addressing a press conference here, however, alleged that there have been discrepancies in the utilisation of MGNREGA funds in the districts of the eastern state.

Dismissing the TMC's allegations that she refused to meet the West Bengal ruling party's team in New Delhi for talks regarding MGNREGA dues, she said, "I wanted to meet them and waited for nearly two-and-a-half hours for them. But they kept shifting goalposts on the number of members of their delegation."

"They are now leveling false allegations that I ran away through the back door. The TMC is spreading lies, they did not want to meet me, they just wanted to create drama," she claimed.

She expressed her willingness to engage in talks with the TMC delegation anytime but questioned the West Bengal ruling party's sincerity on the issue.

Earlier, TMC national general secretary Abhishek Banerjee and party MLAs, MPs and ministers, along with those engaged in MGNREGA work, had staged a protest at Jantar Mantar in New Delhi and marched to the Rural Development Ministry at Krishi Bhawan, where they were scheduled to meet Jyoti.

However, after around an hour-and-a-half, the TMC leaders claimed that the minister refused to meet them, restricting the number of members in the delegation to five.

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