BHUBANESWAR: As special interventions in districts affected by Red rebels failed to change ground realities, the Comptroller and Auditor General pulled up the State Government for inadequate planning and poor implementation of projects in areas of development, security and recognition of rights of the affected people.While projects were incorporated in the annual action plans (AAPs) without assessing the actual requirements, the district level committees prepared the plans on the basis of proposals submitted by district officials including block development officers.
As elected representatives of the districts concerned were not consulted during formulation of action plan, many of the completed projects remained either idle or misutilised with no benefit to the end users, the CAG report said.As many as 9,040 projects were included in AAPs of five test-checked districts without any feasibility study or survey. This resulted in cancellation of 362 projects like building for Anganwadi centres (AWCs) and additional classrooms at an estimated cost of `42.87 crore.
“The reasons for cancellation were non-existence of AWCs and schools in villages concerned, non-existence of villages where buildings were proposed, non-availability of land, pre-existence of structures at selected sites, selected sites being in forest area or private land,” the performance audit report said.
The five test-checked districts where the 362 projects were cancelled are Sambalpur (132), Deogarh (94), Malkangiri (61), Koraput ( 48) and Sundargarh (27).
The CAG report on general and social sectors for year ended March 2016 was tabled in the monsoon session of the Assembly on Saturday. Pointing out further inadequacy in the planning, the premier audit agency of the Central Government said, “While skill development was not given due priority, there was near total absence of livelihood initiatives for increasing income of the local people of the Left Wing Extremism (LWE) affected districts.”
Citing instances of diversion of funds, the report said programme implementation was marred by delay in execution of projects while expenditure on several projects was unfruitful as 43 projects in these districts remained unused.With 18 LWE affected districts included under IAP programme and each district entitled to `30 crore Central assistance per annum, the State Government had to lose Central assistance of `497.43 crore during 2013-14 and 2014-15 due to non-fulfillment of prescribed conditions. The State received `582.57 crore as against its entitlement of `1,080 crore, the report said.The CAG further pointed out that delay in completion of security related projects had not only affected the operation efficiency of the security personnel, but also compelled them to stay in incomplete barracks without electricity, toilet and other basic facilities.