Ministry officials have said that there have been large sums of unspent money with states, to the tune of more than Rs 4,000 crore, under various minority schemes.
The Union Minority Affairs Ministry has scrapped as many as 58,456 “units” or small infrastructure projects under a central socio-economic development scheme after finding out that these never took off after being proposed in 2008-09.
“We have done this in consonance with the states. After having found that these units had not taken off in the past decade, we had asked the states to consider whether they want to drop the proposals altogether,” said a Ministry official.
The ministry appraised more than 11 lakh projects under the Pradhan Mantri Jan Vikas Karyakram (PMJVK) since 2008-09.
The PMJVK is a centrally sponsored scheme implemented by the Minority Affairs Ministry. It develops infrastructure projects for socio-economic development.
Under PMJVK, project-wise funds are released to states and UTs after they send proposals to the Centre. Proposals received in the Ministry are considered and approved by the Empowered Committee of PMJVK after consultation with the concerned central ministries.
Ministry officials have said that there have been large sums of unspent money with states, to the tune of more than Rs 4,000 crore, under various minority schemes.
“We have now said that future projects will be sanctioned, and funds will be given based on utilisation certificates. We will also map all physical assets under the Ministry schemes through Gati Shakti and geotag them to understand the actual utilisation of funds and the building of infrastructure,” said sources in the ministry.
From 2014-15 to 2021-22, an expenditure of Rs 9,37,819 lakh was incurred under the scheme. During this period, more than 50 major projects, including school buildings, hostels and classroom aids, have been sanctioned.
Since 2014-15, the ministry has sanctioned projects worth Rs 17,65,904 lakh under PMJVK with Central share of Rs 12,33,688.93 lakh. The Centre covers 60% funding of a project to the states’ 40% while the projects are sanctioned jointly by the state and centre.
