SHILLONG, March 24: The recently-constituted state BJP’s central scheme monitoring committee (CSMC) is all set to file RTIs on all centrally-sponsored schemes and programmers in the state in a bid to unearth the various lacunae and anomalies and also to identify the ghost beneficiaries.
The RTI findings would be compiled into a comprehensive report and submitted to the Centre.
“We are going to file RTIs as we want to verify whether the actual number of beneficiaries on the ground tallies with the RTI replies since we are aware of several ghost beneficiaries,” chairperson of the Garo Hills CSMC, Bernard Marak said on Thursday.
He claimed that schemes were not being implemented properly. “All the central schemes should reach the beneficiaries and no one should be deprived,” he stated.
“We are going to submit a report to state leaders and it will subsequently go to the Centre,” he added.
Marak alleged that there are many ghost beneficiaries since the state is not updating the account numbers of the beneficiaries and in most of the cases the money is handed over through certain departments and government machineries and this is where the lapses occur.
He said that beneficiaries of the old-age pension and widow pension are not getting their due of Rs 500 per month directly into their bank account.
“It is our duty to monitor and find out whether the schemes are being implemented properly or not and if not it is our duty to apprise our leaders about the lapses so that the people do not get deprived,” Marak said.
Stating that political parties are trying to draw mileage out of centrally-sponsored schemes, the BJP leader claimed that members of political parties have collected the forms for PMAY, the low-cost housing scheme in addition to KISAN card.
“The government is trying to create an impression before the public that they will get the scheme only if they come through any political party and it is unfair,” he said.