A total of around Rs 3,737 crore was collected till November 30 as funds of the District Mineral Foundations (DMF) in the State, whereas the DMFs have been constituted in all the 30 districts, said Chief Secretary AP Padhi.
He informed that around Rs1,369 crore came from coal and lignite, Rs 2,351 crore came from major minerals other than coal and Rs17 crore came from minor minerals.
Besides, Padhi said the projects were sanctioned under two broad heads viz. “High Priority” and “Other Priority.” The high priority areas included projects like housing, drinking water, health, sanitation, roads, welfare of women and children and skill development.
The projects of worth Rs 1,200 crore have been sanctioned in these areas. Besides, projects of worth Rs 707 crore has been sanctioned for other priority areas like connectivity, public facility energy, irrigation, afforestation etc. In total around Rs1, 907 crore has been allotted to different districts against 5,886 sanctioned projects, informed Padhi.
Development Commissioner Sri Balakrishnan said the sanctioned projects would touch Rs 6,000 crore by end of January next.
The facts came to the fore during a video conferencing between the Union Cabinet Secretary and Chief Secretary Padhi, Development Commissioner Balakrishnan and Principal Secretary Steel and Mines Raj Kumar Sharma.
The Cabinet Secretary appreciated the initiatives taken by Odisha in implementing the Pradhan Mantri Khanij Kshetra Kalayan Yojana and said Odisha’s performance is the best among all States.
Odisha has developed and applied an IT based monitoring system in shape of a web-portal for sanction and monitoring of the projects under the DMF. Padhi added that very shortly this portal would also be made transaction based. It was known from the review that Government of India would put in place a Central web-portal for monitoring progress of the scheme. Sources said Odisha’s portal would be taken as a model portal in development of the Central portal.