Beneficiaries of Vulnerable Group Development (VGD) programme staged demonstrations at Ramananda-Khazura union parishad of Singra upazila in Natore yesterday morning, protesting alleged irregularities by upazila chairman.
The beneficiaries alleged that they had been receiving only 12-15kg wheat instead of 30kg every month for the last 10 months.
At least 178 people were selected for VGD programme, the largest social safety net programme of the government that exclusively targets ultra poor households.
The selected people were supposed to get 30kg of wheat under the social safety network programme every month.
They said son of upazila Chairman Rana and his followers had seized the cards of seven women three months back as they protested against the misdeed.
Since then, they have not been getting the government grant.
Like the previous month, employees of the chairman gave them the reduced amount of wheat, creating annoyance among them.
They then chanted slogans against the chairman and demanded disciplinary action against him and his cohorts.
Upon seeing the angry reaction of the beneficiaries, chairman’s son seized the cards of Momin, Hudu, Malek and Anser and also stopped providing the wheat.
Afterwards, president of upazila unit Awami League Ohidur Sheikh rushed to the spot and recovered the cards.
Sweety, wife of Saiful Islam of village Malkur, said they had kept mum, although the authorities had been giving them 12-15kg of wheat from the very beginning.
Shyamol, secretary of the union, said they were compelled to stop the distribution to avoid any untoward incident.
“The chairman will give the wheat Wednesday (today),” he said.
Sultan Ali, chairman of the upazila, denied the allegation and said he would distribute the wheat in presence of the upazila nirbahi officer.
UNO Salma Khatun said she was informed about the demonstration, adding from now on the distribution will take place in presence of her representatives.
About the irregularities, she said she would take necessary steps after investigation.
