Mumbai, July 27 -- At least 14,298 men fraudulently enrolled in Maharashtra's Ladki Bahin Yojana and received monetary assistance intended solely for economically backward women, an internal audit by the state's Women and Child Development (WCD) Department has revealed.

Launched last year ahead of the 2024 Assembly elections, the scheme offers Rs 1,500 a month to women aged 21-65 whose families earn less than Rs 2.5 lakh annually.

Ten months after the scheme's rollout, the audit has uncovered that these men exploited the online registration system by posing as female applicants, resulting in an erroneous disbursal of Rs 21.44 crore, reported NDTV.

The costliest violation involved over 7.97 lakh women who enrolled as third members from ...