Rural Development Minister Badri Narayan Patra on Thursday said projects taken up in the State under the Prime Minister Gram Sadak Yojana (PMGSY) have been delayed due to tardy release of funds by the Union Government. “The Centre has neglected in releasing funds to the State under the PMGSY as a result of which some project works have been delayed,” the Minister said while replying to an Adjournment Motion moved by Opposition Chief Whip Tara Prasad Bahinipati.
However, members of both Opposition Congress and BJP members alleged that the PMGSY project works have been of low quality as they are not being checked regularly due to shortage of staffs and massive corruption in the implementation of projects. The Minister informed that the State Government had urged the Centre to provide Rs 1800 crore for taking up 4000-km roads in order to connect 1.900 non-communicated villages during 2014-15. To this, the Centre promised to give Rs 1,178 crore during this year but has so far given Rs 1050.51 crore. However, the State Government has already spent Rs 1281 crore.
The Minister further said that the Centre is yet to release the rest amount even though the Chief Minister has written to the Centre for relase of Rs 1700 crore in this year. “While the State Government has spent all money released by the Centre, there is no fund for the projects for the last two months of this current fiscal,” the Minister said, adding that the State Government has been taking up the projects as planned.
The Minister informed that the PMGSY scheme is being implemented in the State to construct all weather roads in the 18043 non-communication villages since 2000-01. So far projects for 13,755 projects have been approved. The Centre has so far released a total of Rs 11,942 crore against sanctioned projects worth Rs 17,814.24 crore in the last 15 years from 2000-01 to 2014-15. However, a total of 8,033 roads having length of 30,872.18 km have been constructed.
While Opposition members Taraprasad Bahinipati, Krushna Chandra Sagaria, Chandra Sekhar Majhi, Pradip Purohit and Prafulla Majhi participated in the discussion, Purna Chandra Sethi, Anant Das and Prafulla Samal participated though Calling Attention notice.