Amid the tug-of-war between the State ruling BJD and opposition BJP over exclusion of local public representatives at the functions being held for distribution of lPG cylinders under the Pradhan Mantri Ujjwala Yojana (PMUY), PMUY State Nodal Officer G Swaminathan on Tuesday made it clear that there is no formal guideline to invite public representatives to the functions.
“There is no formal guideline to invite public representatives to the ongoing PMUY distribution functions in the State, but if the public representatives wish to come they are most welcome,” Swaminathan told reporters here.
He, however, said that though they had invited public representatives for the State-level PMUY launch programme, no body turned up.
“Nobody turned up during the State-level launch of PMUY despite our invitation. We don’t know why they remained absent,” said Swaminathan.
Recently, disturbances had marred such functions in Cuttack and Puri.
On August 11, Union Petroleum Secretary KD Tripathi had written to State Chief Secretary AP Padhi seeking support for the Indian Oil Corporation limited (IOCl) functionaries in the smooth and hassle-free distributions of lPG under the PMUY in the wake of the stray incidents of disturbances allegedly by BJD activists.
Replying to the Union Secretary, Padhi on August 22 wrote to the former suggesting inviting local public representatives as well as taking the district administration into confidence instead of bypassing both of them.
“The association of local representatives would rapidly facilitate successful implementation of the scheme. The list of selected beneficiaries in any town, block or panchayat should be shared with the local officials and elected representatives for better transparency in the distribution process. Such functions should, preferably, be held in the premises of Government institutions like blocks, gram panchayats and Urban local Bodies,” Padhi had mentioned in his letter.