Stepping up its attack against the Centre and the BJP over security of women, Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) on Tuesday alleged that the Government was not keen to disburse money from Nirbhaya Fund. Party leader Atishi Marlena said, a response to an RTI application by a volunteer in June this year has revealed that although money was allocated under the Nirbhaya Fund, constituted after the gangrape of a 23-year-old paramedic, there was no disbursement or utilisation of money.
“Nirbhaya Fund has been set up and an amount of Rs1,000 crore has been credited in a Public Account for the same. In the Interim Budget 2014-15, an additional Rs1,000 crore has been allocated for the Nirbhaya Fund. The corpus has not been disbursed/utilised so far because various schemes are yet to be finalised,” the RTI reply said.
Party’s Patiala MP Dharamvira Gandhi said he received a letter from the Women and Child Welfare Ministry stating that the Government proposes to open 50 centres to help women in distress. Gandhi, who is also a parliamentary leader of the party, said he had got a land sanctioned for a centre for women in his constituency, but no money has been released.
“I have now reliably learnt that the Prime Minister’s Office so far has not endorsed the opening of these centres,” the AAP MP claimed.