Early Times Report
Jammu, Jan 13: Rural Development Department (RDD) has miserably failed to utilize the funds that were sanctioned by the Government of India (GoI) for settlement of land acquisition cases to complete Pradhan Mantri Gram Sadak Yojana (PMGSY) due to which many projects are incomplete in J&K.
It’s in place to mention here that the PMGSY guidelines clearly state that it is the responsibility of the State Government to ensure that land is available for taking up a proposed road project and for that a certificate has to be submitted with the proposal.
Sources told Early Times that although the funds for acquisition of land are not covered under PMGSY, the GoI released Rs 700 crore to Jammu and Kashmir as a special one-time dispensation as the cost of land acquisition, covering compensatory afforestation, forest land, trees, private land and structures.
They further said that of Rs 700 crore released by the Centre, Rs 150 crore were lying unspent with J&K Rural Road Development Agency as of 2018.
“It has been observed in some districts that despite allocation of funds the most of the amount of released funds remained unspent for clearance of land acquisition cases,” they added.
They informed that due to non-utilization balance funds by the concerned authorities, around 20 road projects over a half dozen districts could not be completed due to lengthy process of forest clearance, land acquisition and court cases. |
