Early Times Report
Jammu, Apr 28: On one hand the state government had introduced monthly honorarium for Sarpanchs and Panchs of Rs 2500 and Rs 1000 respectively, on the other, the Panchayat bhawans where from Sarpanchs and Panchs have to operate are still under construction.
In Jammu and Kashmir there are nearly 1259 Gram Panchayats functioning without Panchayat bhawans (Panchayat ghars).
Sources informed Early Times that in the last three financial years from 2015-16 to 2017-18, the Ministry of Panchayati Raj didn't provide any financial assistance to Jammu and Kashmir and asked the state government to moblise funds locally for the construction of Gram Panchayat bhawans.
"In this regard, the state government had diverted crores of rupees of MGNERGA funds for the construction of Panchayats bhawans, but ironically crores of rupees are still unpaid to a local contractor", said sources.
Earlier, the Union government had provided financial assistance to state government under the erstwhile scheme of Rajiv Gandhi Panchayat Sashaktikaran Abhiyan (RGPSA) upto 2014-15 against their proposals. But after NDA government came to power, they did nothing for the construction of Panchayat bhawans. Hence, more than one thousand gram panchayats are without official building. In other words, they have no building to organize rural activities.
"Under the recently restructured centrally sponsored scheme of Rashtriya Gram Swaraj Abhiyan (RGSA), which is opertionalised from financial year 2018- 19, the financial assistance is available for the construction of Panchayat bhawans. All the states got financial assistance as per the proposal forwarded by the state governments, but nothing has been sanctioned or allotted to state of Jammu and Kashmir", said sources. |
