Friends like Khirod Nanda, Sunil Panda, Pratap Rout and Umakanta Mohapatro have raised certain fundamental questions the answer for which should be known to everybody. The questions are 1- How much money the government of India sends as 1st installments of MP LADS? 2- Is there any nepotism by ruling party in centre in order to woo the support of the alliance partner? 3- Is it only Odisha who is not utilizing the financial assistance in full or there are also other states who are failed in the same regard? 4- Is the planning commission assessment on the economic need of a state is more on political ground? Is Odisha eligible for special packages? 5- Is the railway being neglect of Odisha for decades? Is it because of the failure by the state to provide matching grants that some central funds are returned? The following are the answers to the questions mentioned above. Answer 1- The government of India sends 50% of the MP LADS allocation i.e. 1Cr. (When I was an MP) as the first installment. Money is not sent as per the requirement of the MP only after the 505 utilization certificate of the 1st installment is sent by the state government the 2nd installment money comes. 2- The central assistance sanction by the planning commission is not based on the direction of the party in power. The system and the procedures of plan and non plan grant to the states are such that discrimination and nepotism cannot take place. There are well defined rules on the basis of which states are sanctioned funds. Only in case of disaster grants and special package grant there could be some discrimination. Special package grant are sanctioned by deducting money from the grant sanctioned to other states. Naturally the other states object to that. So there is nothing sure about the special package grant for example the present central government has sanctioned Rupees 12,000 Cr special package grant to Bihar in 4 installments of Rs 3000 Cr each. And everybody knows, there is a very little possibility of the present central government coming back next year. So is there any guarantee that the next government will certainly go by the decision taken by the present government? When the sanction of special package is political, its withdrawal can also be political. 3- There are some other states like Odisha who are equally inefficient in spending the central assistance in time. So they are also underdeveloped. 4- There are various reasons for not spending the central assistance in time like inefficient administration, corruption, lack of prioritization and urgency, in proper planning and execution, disturbed law & order situation and incapacity to provide matching grants. But non payment of state share of matching grant is a minor point. It all depends upon the good governance shown by a government which facilitate the spending of the grants in a efficient way in time. Proper utilization of the available funds brings in prosperity not the amount of funds sanctioned. 5- Railway may have neglected Odisha in the past because expecting on there was no railway minister from Odisha. Railway wise UP, Bihar, W.B, Maharashtra are developed since the British period because of their plain area, thick population and heavy industrial base. States like Kerala, Rajasthan, M.P., Chattishgarh complaining that they are also neglected railway wise. Just a decade before states like Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, Maharashtra, Rajasthan, M.P, Assam, UP etc were full of meter gauge and narrow gauges. Some states like Bihar & W.B has gained a lot of trains and railway projects because they had railway ministers from the states. Development of railway in Bihar & W.B cannot be termed as neglect to Odisha. It can be termed as a neglect to India. There is no state expect Bihar & W.B which get more annual allocation regularly then Odisha for the last 15 years. During that time Odisha, in terms of annual railway allocation stands among the first 3 states, because railway earns more money from Odisha in terms of transportation of raw materials it can’t be said that all the money would be spent in Odisha only from that point of logic the revenue earning in Odisha is the highest in Kendhujhar district why expenditure wise this poor district is placed 19th? Because the income tax earning is the highest in Mumbai should all the money be spend there only and not in the poor places like Kalahandi? Odisha has got the East Coast Railway headquarters, Talcher-Sambalpur railway line, Langhigad-Junagad, Rayagada-Koraput, Cuttack-Paradeep, Rupsa-Bangriposi, Naupada-Gunpur, Jakpura-Barbil railway lines after independence so let us not sat that there is willful negligence of Odisha by always comparing ourselves with Laloo Yadav, Nitish Kumar, Ramvilas Paswan’s Bihar and Mamta Banerjee’s Bengal. A weak mindset only believes negligence and conspiracy theory.
Posted on: Fri, 28 Jun 2013 06:50:23 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015