SHILLONG: Chief Minister Dr Mukul Sangma informed that the Government would ensure that sanction of schemes do not go beyond the budget allocation to prevent pending dues over the years.
“We found that there is a tendency among different Government departments to sanction schemes three times more than the actual budget allocation. This has created a lot of problems which have led to the increase in pending dues,” Sangma said while replying during the Question Hour in the Assembly here on Wednesday.
The Chief Minister said that the Government tried to tighten the screws in the Sport and Youth Affairs department by allotting schemes as per the budget allocation in the last two years.
He said that previously, there were unlimited sanction of schemes and unlimited appointment of muster rolls which were beyond the funds allocated to the department.
“Due to our initiative, we have been able to get the sanction for the scheme to lay the artificial turf at Mawlai and Mawkyrwat which was proposed two years ago,” the Chief Minister said.
Earlier, Sports and Youth Affairs Minister Zenith M Sangma said that the department has not proposed any new scheme at present since it would like to clear all the pending dues of the previous projects.
“We would like to complete all the pending projects including those which were conceptualized way back in 2000-2001,” Sangma said.
He said that the department is also facing problem of paucity of funds.
“We hope that we will be able to clear all the outstanding dues within the next fiscal year so that the department can initiate new schemes as per the funds allocation,” Zenith Sangma said
Earlier, the Sports and Youth Affairs Minister informed that 42 projects have been sanctioned in the last five years for construction of playgrounds and stadiums in various parts of the State in the last five years.
Out of these 42 projects, he said that 19 projects have been completed while the remaining 23 are in various stages of implementation.