Yogi govt. scraps smartphone scheme of Samajwadi Party

TIL Desk/National/Lucknow/Yogi Adityanath government scrapped former Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav’s pet project – the Samajwadi Smartphone Yojana. In September last year, Akhilesh Yadav had announced to distribute nearly five crore smartphones at a highly subsidised rate if Samajwadi Party returns to power. Akhilesh had described the project as “biggest attempt to bridge the digital divide”.

The then state government had launched a website where people could get themselves enrolled under the scheme. The scheme received over 1.4 crore registrations since its launch. Confirming the news regarding scrapping of the project, additional chief secretary (IT and Electronics) said registration for scheme has been stopped with immediate effect.

Ahead of the state Assembly election, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) had approached the Election Commission complaining about Samajawadi Party’s smartphone project. In January, the BJP had filed a petition with the poll panel against the Samajwadi Party’s smartphone distribution scheme, saying it amounted to violation of the Model Code of Conduct.