GUWAHATI, Feb 18 � Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi today sought to refute charges made by BJP MP Bijoya Chakravarty that the State Government had failed to utilise Central funds, saying that it was the Centre that had adopted a discriminatory attitude towards the State by abnormally delaying fund release to the State.
Gogoi, who was addressing the media, said that till date the Centre had not released any flood-affected rehabilitation fund despite the fact that the State Government had submitted the proposal way back in October last year. The Centre sent a team for flood damage assessment only in February this year, he said.
Gogoi said the State Government had submitted a utilisation certificate against an amount of Rs 5,236.98 crore in the financial year 2013-14 in respect of several Centrally-funded programmes such as IAY, MGNREGS, Sarva Siksha Abhijan, NRHM, Midday Meal, etc., but it received only Rs 2,591.62 crore against a fund allocation of Rs 7,161.57 crore against these programmes.
Gogoi further alleged that Chakravarty, as the Guwahati MP, had failed to get a huge sum meant for the city�s development, released from the Centre.
Asserting that a uniform model of development would harm the country, Gogoi also said that the new economic policy being pursued by the BJP Government at the Centre would adversely hit backward states like Assam.
�Advanced states such as Gujarat which already have sufficient infrastructure and industry, will benefit from the market economic policy, but poor states like Assam or the North-east as a whole do not stand to gain from it,� Gogoi told mediapersons.
Reasoning that a backward State like Assam needed more Central funds, the Chief Minister said the much-touted �Make in India� policy would hardly make any impact in Assam and the North-east because the Centre had withdrawn the special incentives to the region under the North East Industrial and Investment Policy (NEIIP).
�This will prevent investment in Assam. We want the Centre to do more than providing lip services for the region�s development,� he added.
Gogoi further said that the State Government was not getting the due oil royalty from the Centre because of the discriminatory attitude of the latter. �We are yet to receive oil royalty worth Rs 1,000 crore from the Centre,� he said.
Gogoi said he had taken up the issues with the Centre on many occasions but to no avail. �The Centre keeps on delaying it under one pretext or the other. This is hampering the State�s development process,� he said.
