BENGALURU: More than 100 legislators have not yet given a list of developmental works to be carried out under the local area development scheme. Most of them have not given this list for the last year too, and the pending amount for the past two years is more than Rs 400 crore. This fund is made available to legislators on the lines of the Local Area Development Fund available to Members of Parliament.
Each of the legislators has been given Rs 2 crore to spend on developmental work in their constituency, and Chief Minister BS Yediyurappa has reminded legislators to inform how they would develop their constituency, using this fund. The reminder comes because most of them have not even considered filing the reply so far. Under the programme, the legislators write to the jurisdictional district commissioners and inform them about the works that need this Rs 2 crore fund.
There are 225 MLAs and 75 MLCs, with 105 MLAs and 18 MLCs in the BJP. Each one has to present a list of developmental work to be taken up, using the fund, and is to be presented to the district administration. These are mostly related to civic infrastructure.
The funds are usually used by legislators to develop anganwadis or for setting up or renovating health or educational infrastructure, or water conservation, and the CM has asked the legislators to present this so that development can be taken up by officials. Sources said, “Many don’t file this list because of plain apathy, and some don’t file it because they wait for a bribe as a cut from the funds offered for development.’’