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| Financial bunglings in SKEWPY scheme in Doda | | | Majid Malik
Doda, Sept 2: The state government's Voluntary Service Allowance (VSA) scheme announced under Sher-e-Kashmir Employment and Welfare Program for Youth (SKEWPY) for jobless educated youth is almost defunct due to financial bungling, nepotism and favouritism in Doda district.
Given the huge unemployment in the state, the government announced the VSA scheme in 2010 to provide monthly allowance to the educated youth who have crossed 28 years of age and are yet to settle themselves in life.
Under the scheme, a monthly allowance of Rs 500 to Rs 1100 is given to the registered youth depending upon their academic and technical qualifications. But, the scheme has been facing a number of problems in Doda district since its launch in 2009 due to untimely release of funds and budgetary constraints and due to favouritism and nepotism in Doda as according to sources some registered un-employed boys were not getting a single penny from the last two or three years and even some government employees including teachers are getting allowance by the concerned department without any fear . This is amid a growing number of unemployed youth across the state.
"The budget as well as the funds released are not sufficient for growing number of registered youth which forces them to wait for months together to get their allowances and on the other hand nepotism and favouritism has created mess in the whole system in Doda district," sources told Early Times.
The number of registered youth under the scheme has increased from around 27000 in 2010-11 to around 50000 in 2012-13 in the state while the budget has surged from around Rs nine crore to Rs 32 crore during the period. Meanwhile, the number of registered youth is expected to increase by several thousand this year, and as per sources the estimated budget is around Rs 65 crore for this fiscal.
"But department has not received any money for several months and in district offices problem is much worse and the youth there have not received allowances for very long time," the sources said.
An educated youth from Bhaderwah , who has been registered under the scheme since April 2013, said that he has not received any allowance for last five months and even some government teachers are continuously receiving the same and alleged pick and choose in the distribution of un-employment allowance in Doda district and demanded high level inquiry .
When senior officer of SKI office Doda was contacted, he acknowledged that the youth haven't received the monthly allowance for last two months due to financial constraints.
"There are some financial constants due to which allowances are not distributed on time. Also, this is a big scheme with an annual budget of around Rs 67 crore and this is bound to face some hindrances in releasing of money," he said "We have distributed all the allowance among the youth up to March 2013 and we are likely to receive funds next month. Some youth lie that they have not received allowance for long time," he added. As per the figures available, more than 11136 unemployed educated youth are entitled to VSA in Jammu Division under SKEWPY launched in the state in April 2010In Jammu region, District Poonch tops the list with more than 1788 unemployed educated youth receiving the VSA followed by district Doda with 1623 beneficiaries. Reasi district has lowest number of 405 unemployed educated youth receiving VSA, while over 1590 youth are covered under VSA in district Jammu. |
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