By Our Reporter
SHILLONG: The district administration of West Garo Hills has lodged ten FIRs against Secretaries of the Village Employment Councils under the flagship programme MGNREGA for contravention of the provisions, misappropriation of funds and non-completion of projects under the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme.
The crackdown comes in the wake of deliberate and willful non-compliance of these office bearers of VECs to the directions of the Block Development Officers for refunding the misappropriated amount from projects implemented in the last financial year to correcting anomalies and finishing up incomplete projects.
According to West Garo Hills Deputy Commissioner Pravin Bakshi, while in some cases the VECs have not completed the work, in other cases they have not performed the work as per specifications and in deference to the work order indicating the exact measurement of work or number of ring wells , culverts , width of bridges .
In yet other instance, the VEC Secretary has misappropriated money from the project or held back the wages meant for the job card holders. The ten FIRs have been lodged in Dalu Police Station, Ampati Police Station, Phulbari Police Station, Garobadha Police Station and Araimile Police Station and directions have been given to the Officers-in Charge of these police stations to register cases against the VEC secretaries for criminal conspiracy, misappropriation of funds under MGNREGA
The decision to take this strong action was taken in a review meeting held in DRDA conference hall with the Block Development Officers and the Additional Programme Officers under MGNREGA recently where it was found out that in certain cases even after a lapse of 7-8 months VECs had not refunded the misappropriated money of wages component or material component.
He also said that this financial year funds to the tune of Rs. 55 crore have been held up by the Ministry of Rural Development, because they opined that strict action was not forthcoming and not reflected in the action taken report.
While the district administration had till now focused on refund and issued ultimatums waiting patiently for course correction factoring in the exposure and knowledge levels of the office bearers.