By Our Reporter
SHILLONG: The first meeting of the State Rural Employment Society (SRES) governing body to deliberate on how to streamline MNREGS funds is likely to be held sometime this week. The SRES was constituted to specifically handle the State Employment Guarantee Fund (SEGF), the new State fund for MNREGS.
“Before constitution of the SEGF, there was a huge delay in disbursement of funds under the scheme since the funds released by the Centre had to be routed through the Finance department,” official sources said.
With SEGF directly getting the funds from the Centre now, official sources said, there has been smooth disbursement of the funds.
Recalling the problem faced by the job card holders under the flagship programme in East Khasi Hills last year due to the delay in the release of funds by the Centre, the sources said the State fund would be beneficial whenever there is a delay in release of the Central funds.
“There are provisions of allocation of funds through the SEGF. The money would again be deposited to the SEGF once the Centre releases the funds,” the sources said.
Chief Secretary WMS Pariat is the chairman of the SEGF. Principal Secretary, Community and Rural Development (C&RD) is the member secretary while Secretary and Director C&RD, all the deputy commissioners, representatives of the State Bank of India and Post Office and officials of the Meghalaya Rural Development Society are members.