In the midst of the stand-off between the Congress and its ally NCP at the Centre, the urban development department headed by Maharashtra chief minister Prithviraj Chavan on Friday came in for criticism from his deputy Ajit Pawar over its alleged failure to spend funds allocated to it.
“Urban development department is primarily responsible for not spending the fund allocated to them,” Mr Pawar, who holds the finance portfolio, told the Legislative Council while replying to a question on alleged inadequate expenditure of plan funds by various departments.
Mr Pawar said “The Urban Development Department had utilised only `2,299 crore out of the total `4,109 crore allocated to it and its performance vis a vis with other government departments was less”.
The deputy CM urged all departments to fully utilise funds provided to them and said the government planned to have quarterly review meetings to monitor expenditure.
Mr Pawar’s comment comes in the backdrop of the continuing stand-off between NCP-led by his uncle and Union minister Sharad Pawar and the Congress at the Centre.
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Pawar raises questions on food bill
Age Correspondent
New Delhi, July 20
Even though the Centre appears keen to push through the Food Security Bill with some key changes, Union agriculture minister Sharad Pawar is learnt to have raised questions about the viability of the scheme with Prime Minister Manmohan Singh.
The Prime Minister had recently called a meeting, which was attended by Mr Pawar, deputy chairman of the Planning Commission Montek Singh Ahluwalia, Union minister of food and consumer affairs K.V. Thomas, to discuss new set of suggestions on Food Security Bill. The Centre is learnt to have decided to go ahead with the suggestion to exclude 33 per cent of the people from the ambit of the food entitlement, which will take the food subsidy bill to `1.15 lakh crores. The new proposals, while seeking food entitlement of 67 per cent people, the coverage in 205 poorest district would be about 90 per cent. However, Mr Pawar has raised concerns over the viability of the food subsidy burden.