SHILLONG: A section of members of the Village Employment Council (VEC) of Kyndong Wahlang village near Sohiong, East Khasi Hills, has been accused of swindling funds under the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MGNREGS).
The Seng Samla Mawkneng which filed an RTI relating to the implementation of the MGNREGS in the village in June last year has claimed that the RTI finding revealed that funds worth more than Rs 2 lakh meant for the construction of a motorable road earmarked under the MNGREGS had been swindled.
SSM president C Rani said that as per the RTI documents, they found out that a total amount of Rs 9.53 lakh was sanctioned for construction of 100 meter road in the village which include Rs 5.50 lakh for wages and Rs 3.3 lakh was for material and skilled labour.
“After examining the documents, we suspect that there is a serious manipulation of the funds on the part of the VEC. The amount which was utilized does not tally with the work which was done,” Rani said.
He said that the Seng Samla had written to the VEC at least on three occasions to give clarifications on the findings of the RTI but they failed to comply with their request.
The SSM president said that the Block Development Officer (BDO) of Mawphlang Community and Rural Development Block finally conducted an inquiry at his own level following pressure from their side in December last year.
“Strangely, the BDO refused to provide the copy of his inquiry report when they had requested. Finally, we got the inquiry report through an RTI which revealed that they was misappropriation of the Rs 1.58 lakh,” Rani said.
He said that they were not satisfied with the inquiry report since the fund which was misappropriated will be over Rs 2 lakh.
“We decided to file an FIR against the chairman and secretary of the VEC for misusing the funds of the scheme,” SSM president said while expressing surprise that the police did not take any action despite an FIR. East Khasi Hills superintendent of police M. Kharkrang said, however, that the matter was still under investigation.
The SSM president said that they had also requested the VEC to provide the job cards and the pass books of the various beneficiaries of the scheme.
Informing that initially the VEC had refused to comply with the request, the SSM president said that they finally agreed when they threatened to file another FIR.
“After going into the details, they found that the money which was deposited in the bank was less compared to the amount mentioned in the job cards. This itself is a proof that the VEC had swindled the funds,” he said while adding that there was so many over writings in the job cards by the application of white ink.
Interestingly, he alleged that in many of the job cards, they found that the VEC had claimed paying the wages till 2022 and 2025.
Disappointed with the failure of the authorities to act as per the FIR, he said that the members of the village have organized a signature campaign to put pressure on the Government to initiate some action against erring VEC members.