GUWAHATI, March 5 - Though the Government of India has been implementing a comprehensive border areas development programme in the areas having international border to improve border management, the Assam Government has not been able to utilise the funds provided by the Centre for the purpose. The Assam Government has also not been able to provide the utilisation certificates of the funds received for the purpose for years.
According to a report of the Border Management division of the Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA), for years, the Assam Government has not been able to provide the utilisation certificates of the funds released for the border areas development programme. The report said that because of non receipt of the utilisation certificates, the Centre did not release any fund to the State under the programme in the year 2013-14.
Utilisation certificates from the Assam Government under the border areas development programme are pending from 2009-10 and this becomes a common phenomenon every year. The report said that in the year 2015-16, the Centre released an amount of Rs 3066 lakh to the Assam Government under the project. But, till January this year, the State Government could provide utilisation certificates of only Rs 40 lakh. In the current financial year, the allocation for the State is Rs 4600 lakh and the Centre released Rs 2703 lakh. But the State Government has not been able to submit utilisation certificate of any money.
The programme is implemented in 28 blocks of seven districts of Assam having international border. The report said that the State Government has been using the border area development fund for construction of public health centres, school buildings, community centres, roads and bridges, drinking water facilities etc.
The utilisation by the other states having international border is much better than Assam. The project is implemented in 45 blocks of 15 districts having international border in Arunachal Pradesh and the state has not been able to submit utilisation certificates of the funds only in the last three years. However, the state managed to submit the utilisation certificates in all the previous years.
The report said that the Government of Arunachal Pradesh has not submitted the utilisation certificates of the funds released in the current financial year. The Arunachal Government received Rs 8,996 lakh in the year 2015-16 and it is yet to submit utilisation certificates of only Rs 1,623 lakh, while in the previous year, it received Rs 9,249 lakh and is yet to submit utilisation certificate of Rs 532 lakh.
The performance of Manipur is also much better than Assam in utilisation of the border area development fund. In the year 2014-15, Manipur received Rs 2,300 lakh and it is yet to submit utilisation certificate of Rs 70 lakh, while, in 2015-16, the state utilised Rs 1,169 lakh of the Rs 2,200 lakh. The State received an amount of Rs 2,430 for the current financial year.
The performance of the other northeastern states is even better as Meghalaya, Mizoram and Nagaland managed to submit the utilisation certificates of the funds allocated up to 2014-15 and only small portions of the funds could not be utilised in 2015-16.
