Govt study finds misuse of MPLAD scheme

Taxpayers money provided to Indian Members of Parliament for public interest works has been used to benefit religious organisations, individual government officers and has also been mis-appropriated, a government study of 135 constituencies has revealed.

Updated on: Aug 15, 2010, 17:37:42 IST

Hindustan Times | By Chetan Chauhan, New Delhi

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Taxpayers money provided to Indian Members of Parliament for public interest works has been used to benefit religious organisations, individual government officers and has also been mis-appropriated, a government study of 135 constituencies has revealed.

Each Member of Parliament is provided Rs two crore every year to carry out works for direct benefit of people such as constructing of well or repair of roads but the study by National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development (NABARD) has confirmed fears of many planners that the funds are misused.

In Chandrapur district in Maharashtra, the district collector given the responsibility under MPLAD rules to ensure proper use of money spent it on constructing a waiting room and then building a conference room in his own office. In Osmanabad district of the state, the collector bought computer and printers for the money meant to be used provide basic families to people, such as digging a well or constructing a village road.

The 80-page report is full of instances (see graphic) where MPs have allocated huge amount of money to private bodies including temples and churches to develop their infrastructure. For instance, in Vodadora district in Gujarat, a community hall was constructed at Tulsi Vadi Rookadeya Hanuman Temple whereas in Mangalore in Karnataka the money was used to build a press club.

The report also highlighted where money from the MPLAD fund has been released on basis of forged documents. In Andhra Pradesh, money from fund of Lok Sabha MP B J Lakshmi was released on basis of forged letter of the MP. In Bijnore district of Uttar Pradesh, huge funds have been misappropriated allegedly on basis of forged letters in 2009. State government has taken action against official responsible but the money has not been recovered.

Even the money provided from MPLAD scheme for natural disasters such as Tsunami in 2004, Gujarat earthquake and floods in Bihar has been utilised fully. "The state (Gujarat) has failed to furnish reply on details of unspent amount of Rs nine crore given for Gujarat earthquake," the report said. Half of Tsunami work in Andaman and Nicobar Islands has been left incomplete.

Admitting of huge shortcoming in the implementation of the scheme, Minister for Statistics and Programme Implementation Sriprakash Jaiswal said, "we have asked the state governments to recover the misused money from district collectors and take action against officials responsible for the frauds committees." But at the same time, the ministry is considering change in rule to allow MPs to sanction money for private trusts and societies, in which they or their family members have no direct relation.

The report comes at the time when MPs are demanding an increase in their fund from Rs two crore to five crore, which Planning Commission is not willing to provide citing shortage of plan funds. Since the inception of the scheme in 1990, Rs 21,400 crore has been released of which 90 per cent has been spent.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Chetan Chauhan
Chetan Chauhan is the National Affairs Editor looking into all aspects of news and features from across India. A Chevening scholar with over three decades of experience in reporting and news management, Chetan has extensively covered all important aspects of the social sector, political economy, environment and climate change nationally and internationally. He did a journalism course at the Reuters Institute of Journalism in Oxford and Digital Media training at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore. He started as a reporter with The Statesman in 1996 and joined the Hindustan Times in 2000 in the metro bureau covering environment, crime and Delhi politics. He covered hot local news, from the Jessica Lal murder case to the rebellion of Delhi Congress MLAs against then Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit, to the replacement of toxic vehicle fuel with cleaner compressed natural gas (CNG) in the national capital. Some of his stories on air pollution became part of the Supreme Court’s landmark MC Mehta versus Government of India case in the National Capital Region (NCR), forcing the government to take corrective measures. As part of the national political bureau since 2004, he covered important central sectors such as environment, education, social justice, labour, rural development, water resources, renewable energy, agriculture, broadcasting and the Planning Commission for more than a decade producing several exclusive and investigative breaking stories. His specialisation is the environment, having covered at least a dozen United Nations global conferences on climate change, biodiversity and wildlife including climate summits in Paris, Copenhagen and Bali. He also covered India’s two five-year plans ---11th and 12th and reported on drafting and execution of right based laws such as Right to Education, Right to Information and rural job guarantee law, MG-NREGA, now being introduced in new format as VG-RAM-G Act. He has in-depth knowledge of social sector issues. He was one of the first to report on tigers vanishing from Sariska and Panna wildlife reserves in 2004 and 2008, respectively, leading to the setting up of the National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) and the introduction of stringent penal provisions for poaching. He has written extensively on the rising human-animal conflict in India and the degradation of India’s biodiversity hotspots because of mining and other activities. Since 2004, Chetan has covered Parliament comprehensively and participated in training on the nuanced coverage of Parliament proceedings. He has travelled extensively across India to cover national and provincial elections since 1998, especially in the Hindi heartland states, considered India’s road to power. He writes a regular column for Hindustan Times, Ecostani, on important national politics, economy, Himalayan ecology and environmental issues. His other responsibilities include providing inputs for edits and edit page articles for the publication, apart from managing news flow from across India.Read More

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