KOLKATA, June 18 (TNN): Chief minister Mamata Banerjee has urged MPs to donate 1 crore from their local area development funds to the state health sector. The CM conveyed her request through state chief secretary Samar Ghosh at a meeting with MPs at Writers’ Buildings on Friday.
The meeting was convened since Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has sought a performance report of MPLad projects. Although the matter has been a planning commission subject, this time the prime minister wants MPs to buck up and spend the local area development (LAD) funds allocated to them. The MPLad funds have recently been increased from 2 crore to 5 crore.
Mamata has, thus, sought a share of the funds for the health sector of which she herself is the minister. Much needs to be done to upgrade the hospitals but the state government is currently reeling under an acute funds crunch.
Therefore, the chief minister’s thought of providing hospitals with funds was appreciated by MPs from her own party. But Left members who attended the meeting were not impressed. And the likes of Prasanta Chatterjee and Susmita Barui wanted to know why they should go against existing rules just because the CM so wished.
Kakoli Ghosh Dastidar, MP from Barasat, explained, “Didi has asked us to donate 1 crore to our district hospitals since we would be better placed to understand the requirement.” The 42 MPs from Bengal have been allocated 132.62 crore, but have managed to spend 62.47 crore till March 2011. Only 1,442 out of the sanctioned 4,083 projects by the MPs have been completed. Dinesh Trivedi, MP from Barrackpore, tops the list of those who have made most use of their funds. Ghosh Dastidar, who happens to be a member of the Parliament Standing Committee for the MPLad scheme, said the guidelines for disbursement of MPs’ funds were currently being revised.
For instance, the number of days for executing projects with MPlad funds used to be 45 days. It would now be increased to 75 days so that district magistrates could study the projects and give their views accordingly. “Currently, the DMs don’t even bother to go through the files because the time is too short,” said MP Satabdi Roy. The other changes include allowing NGOs to have access to the funds and making the areas of allocation of funds for Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes available to 112 blocks outside an MPs own area.
The meeting was convened since Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has sought a performance report of MPLad projects. Although the matter has been a planning commission subject, this time the prime minister wants MPs to buck up and spend the local area development (LAD) funds allocated to them. The MPLad funds have recently been increased from 2 crore to 5 crore.
Mamata has, thus, sought a share of the funds for the health sector of which she herself is the minister. Much needs to be done to upgrade the hospitals but the state government is currently reeling under an acute funds crunch.
Therefore, the chief minister’s thought of providing hospitals with funds was appreciated by MPs from her own party. But Left members who attended the meeting were not impressed. And the likes of Prasanta Chatterjee and Susmita Barui wanted to know why they should go against existing rules just because the CM so wished.
Kakoli Ghosh Dastidar, MP from Barasat, explained, “Didi has asked us to donate 1 crore to our district hospitals since we would be better placed to understand the requirement.” The 42 MPs from Bengal have been allocated 132.62 crore, but have managed to spend 62.47 crore till March 2011. Only 1,442 out of the sanctioned 4,083 projects by the MPs have been completed. Dinesh Trivedi, MP from Barrackpore, tops the list of those who have made most use of their funds. Ghosh Dastidar, who happens to be a member of the Parliament Standing Committee for the MPLad scheme, said the guidelines for disbursement of MPs’ funds were currently being revised.
For instance, the number of days for executing projects with MPlad funds used to be 45 days. It would now be increased to 75 days so that district magistrates could study the projects and give their views accordingly. “Currently, the DMs don’t even bother to go through the files because the time is too short,” said MP Satabdi Roy. The other changes include allowing NGOs to have access to the funds and making the areas of allocation of funds for Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes available to 112 blocks outside an MPs own area.