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IANS
Mayawati crackdown on NREGS bungling eyewash: Congress
2010-03-31 19:50:00
The Congress Wednesday termed the suspension of 22 officials by Uttar
Pradesh Chief Minister Mayawati for alleged bungling of funds meant
for the National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (NREGS) as an
'eyewash'.
The chief minister's move Tuesday night came after Congress general
secretary Rahul Gandhi alleged there was bungling of NREGS funds.
Congress spokesman Subodh Srivastava said the suspensions were an
'eyewash' in view of the suspected huge volume of pilferage across the
state.
'Each of the suspended officials were junior functionaries, and no
action has been taken against any senior official without whose
connivance or complicity the bungling could not have been
accomplished,
Rahul Gandhi had sought to pointedly draw the state government's
attention to irregularities in Sultanpur, which covers his own Amethi
parliamentary constituency. However, the state government found
largescale bungling in four other districts as well - Gonda,
Balrampur, Chitrakoot and Mahoba.
While a sum of Rs.1 crore was found to have been used out of NREGS
funds in Gonda to purchase toys and calendars, a similar amount was
devoted towards purchase of sub-standard tents and first-aid boxes in
Balrampur. Likewise, as many as 700 digital cameras were purchased for
about Rs.60 lakh in Chitrakoot and 247 steel cupboards were bought in
Mahoba.
It was suspected that many of these purchases were made only on paper,
as not more than 25 percent of the cameras and cupboards could be
traced on physical verification, according to a departmental official.
Interestingly, the Uttar Pradesh government got into action only after
the union rural development ministry asked for details of measures
initiated by the state against reported irregularities in the
implementation of NREGS here. The union ministry had sought personal
appearance of the state Rural Development Principal Secretary Sri
Krishna.
Rahul Gandhi said at a district level meeting on NREGS in Sultanpur on
March 26 that the irregularities should be probed by a central agency
in case the state failed to take appropriate steps.
State Rural Development Minister Daddu Prasad, however refused to give
any credit to Rahul Gandhi for it. 'We initiated action into the
matter because our chief minister told us to proceed; and even earlier
we have got FIRs registered in 29 districts against as many as 60 gram
pradhans (village heads) and 30 panchayat (village council) officers,'
he said.
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