AHMEDABAD: Despite voters’ hopes and a hefty development fund at their disposal, Gujarat’s 26 MPs have spent only 4.2% of their allocated MPLAD funds over the past year. Alarmingly, not a single development project has been completed in 14 out of 26 parliamentary constituencies, exposing a serious governance gap.
Gujarat’s Members of Parliament have failed to even scratch the surface of their development responsibility. A staggering 95.8% of the Rs 254.8 crore allocated under the MPLAD Scheme remains unutilised, as per data accessed by NGO Mahiti Adhikar Pahel till July 5, 2025.
The MPLAD (Members of Parliament Local Area Development) Scheme grants every MP Rs 5 crore per year to carry out development works in their constituencies, ranging from roads and sanitation to irrigation and public health. Yet, in the first year of the 18th Lok Sabha, barely Rs 10.72 crore has been spent in total across Gujarat.
According to official Data, leading the sparse spending list is the Bharuch constituency, which has used Rs 1.73 crore, followed by Patan at Rs 1.56 crore, and Sabarkantha at Rs 1.08 crore. However, six constituencies Ahmedabad East, Ahmedabad West, Banaskantha, Chhota Udepur, Gandhinagar, and Navsari haven’t spent a single rupee under the scheme so far.
Ironically, Navsari tops the chart in recommending the highest number of works (297), followed by Mehsana (271) and Kheda (265). Despite the flood of proposals, action on the ground is virtually missing.
The MPLAD guidelines mandate that recommended works must be approved within 45 days, but the numbers tell a different story. Of 3823 works recommended across the state, only 93 have been completed in a year. That’s less than 2.5% execution.
Worse still, no single project has been completed in 14 constituencies, including key regions like Gandhinagar, Jamnagar, Kachchh, and Valsad, indicating systemic delays and apathy.
The data lays bare a troubling mismatch between elected promises and delivery on the ground. For voters who trusted their MPs with development mandates, the dismal MPLAD performance raises serious questions about accountability and intent.