GUWAHATI, June 9 � Presenting a report of the Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) on Nagaon district before the media, public activist Prof Deven Dutta said at a recent press conference that the CAG findings laid bare widespread financial mismanagement, anomalies and corruption in the implementation of various schemes and projects in the district during the period from 2006 to March 30, 2011.
The report was tabled before the Assembly on March 30, 2012. The CAG report detected large-scale anomalies in the implementation of projects under NREGS, DRDA, DUDA, IYA, SGRY, SJGSY, SSA, NRHM, PMGSY, etc., besides mismanagement of MPs� and MLAs� land area development funds.
�All these projects and schemes involve public money and the people have a legitimate right to know whether it served the intended purpose or ended up enriching the coffers of the politician-bureaucrat-contractor nexus. The CAG findings are shocking, and shows why development eludes the State despite spending of huge amounts of money,� Prof Dutta said.
Quoting from the report, Prof Dutta said that the explanations given by the government authorities to the questions raised by CAG were �vague, evasive and perfunctory�.
CAG had pulled up the authorities for lack of specific planning, slow progress of projects, inadmissible expenditure, excess payment and inadequate maintenance of financial records.
Prof Dutta said that targets under Indira Awas Yojana, irrigation, Integrated Child Development Project, PMGSY, SGRY were left largely unfulfilled while there was no monitoring of funds released to self-help groups. Selection of beneficiaries � especially for benefits meant for BPL families � was anomalous while the district planning and monitoring committee did not prepare any perspective plan. Annual action plans were also not there.
Prof Dutta said that Rs 2.69 crore of government revenue from the mouzas was not deposited to the Government�s account.
The CAG report noted that many of the primary and community health centres were utterly mismanaged, with the Salmari 2 health sub-centre being used as a godown. Unscientific storage of medicine was seen at Jogijan while the Naltali multi-purpose health centre had stocked expired medicines.
Prof Dutta said that there was reason to believe that the May 29 incident of assault on two members of the State Assembly�s Public Accounts Committee which came to probe different anomalies had a link with the widespread corruption detected in the implementation of projects by CAG.
�Only those responsible for perpetrating such large-scale corruption can have the audacity to assault PAC members � something that is tantamount to a breach of privilege of the august House and an attack on it, including the Speaker and the Leader of the House,� he said, adding that the House should convene a special session on the matter. �
Prof Dutta said that of the 2,348 LP schools in the district, only 95 had toilets and 645 had girls� toilets, while drinking water facility was available to a meagre 345. Of the 438 UP schools, just a single had drinking water facility.
On the crime front, the district witnessed a whopping 57 per cent rise during 2006-11, with corresponding figures of 3,693 and 5,814 respectively. Kidnapping increased by a staggering 152 per cent, while robbery, extortion and rape rose by 121 pc, 65 pc and 39 pc respectively during the period.
