Excelsior Correspondent
SRINAGAR, Oct 4: The State Government today acknowledged before the Legislative Assembly that 25 per cent of the funds received under various centrally-sponsored schemes during the last year remained unutilized, but assured that the funds have not lapsed and revalidated.
Meanwhile, Speaker of the Assembly allowed discussion on the non-implementation of District Developmental Board decisions after members wanted to raise supplementary questions on the issue.
The Minister for Planning, Ajay Sadhotra informed the House that an amount of Rs. 754.88 crore was provided by the State Planning Department for the implementation of the Centrally Sponsored Schemes in the State during last financial year against which Rs. 688.82 crore have been spent by the end of March 2013.
The Minister while replying to a question of MLA Tarigami informed the House that the funds under CSS do not lapse. The unspent balances at the end of the financial year are revalidated by the concerned departments in the following years for their utilization, he informed.
“At the end of 2012-13 out of the total availability of Central share of Rs. 4703.31 crore, an amount of Rs. 1150.55 crore has remained un-utilized under different CSS”, said the Minister.
Contesting Mr Sadhotra’s claim, CPI (M) leader Yousuf Tarigami said the Government has failed to utilise the funds between 30 per cent and 55 per cent.
The MLA wondered if the Government failed to utilise the funds last year, how was it possible to utilise unspent funds of last year and new funds of this year. “The work season was already over in the hilly areas and would end soon in the plains of Kashmir”, he said.
The Minister said the non-utilisation of funds was due to delay in release from the Centre. “Funds are released late. Naturally, the spending will also be late. In some projects, funds are not released at all,” he said.
The Minister said that the developmental works in the State particularly in respect of CSS have not been hampered for want of matching state share. He said while conveying authorization of the annual plans, the departments are advised to earmark the State share out of their allocations for the projects to be taken up under NABARD as per the norms / guidelines of the schemes, adding that similarly, matching state share as per the funding pattern is being released in respect of various flagship programmes / CSS.
Tarigami also raised the issue of the implementation of the District Development Board decisions. He said that majority of the decisions are not implemented.
Sadhotra said that the decisions taken in the District Development Board meetings are implemented promptly as far as possible. He however, said the decisions involving policy matters and having huge financial implications are critically examined by the concerned administrative departments and if found technically feasible are implemented in a phased manner subject to availability of resources.
The MLAs Harshdev Singh, Mehbooba Mufti, GM Saroori, Zulafkar Ali, and Peer Mansoor raised supplementary questions about non-implementation of decisions of DDB meetings. More MLAs were interested in asking the supplementary question and Speaker Mubarak Gul decided to hold a separate discussion on the matter in the Assembly on October 9.
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