Talking to The Assam Tribune, the Union Home Secretary admitted that the accounts of the NC Hills Autonomous Council were not audited properly for years, which is a matter of concern. He said that the Centre has already written a letter to the State Government advising it to entrust the matter of probing into the allegations of irregularities by the Autonomous Council.
Commenting on the investigation by the National Investigation Agency (NIA), Pillai pointed out that the mandate given to the agency was very limited. “The NIA was asked only to investigate into a specific case of links between militants and politicians and the agency was not asked to investigate into the financial irregularities committed by the Council,” he added. It may be mentioned here that the NIA, in the charge sheet filed before the Special Judge in November last, had also stressed the need for a CBI probe into the financial irregularities.
The Union Home Secretary said that the Comptroller and Auditor General of India (CAG) has already started a thorough audit of the accounts of the NC Hills Autonomous Council, while, the Accountant General would carry out an audit of the accounts of the other Councils formed under the provisions of the Sixth Schedule of the Constitution of India.
Pillai said that the Central Government has initiated efforts to bring in greater financial discipline of the Autonomous Councils formed under the Sixth Schedule. He said that steps have been initiated to amend the Sixth Schedule of the Constitution of India to bring in greater accountability of the Autonomous Councils. He said that it would not be possible to bring a bill to amend the Sixth Schedule in the ensuing Budget session of the Parliament, but the Government would try to bring in the amendments within this year.
The Union Home Secretary revealed that one of the key areas of the proposed amendments would be to ensure that the accounts of the Autonomous Councils are audited every year and the audited accounts are made public so as to bring greater transparency in the functioning and expenditures of the councils. Another major amendment proposed by the Government is to ensure devolution of powers to the grass root level by making provisions for village councils under the Autonomous Councils. In addition to devolution of powers to the grass root level, such a move would ensure greater transparency in implementation of development projects by the Autonomous Councils, he pointed out.
Pillai, who recently visited Kokrajhar for an on the spot assessment of the functioning of the Bodoland Territorial Council (BTC), has a word of praise for the Council formed following the singing of a memorandum of settlement (MoS) with militant outfit Bodo Liberation Tiger (BLT). He expressed the view that the utilization of funds by the BTC was perhaps one of the best among all the Autonomous Councils. The BTC has been able to create lots of infrastructure including roads and bridges and a University, an engineering college and other educational institutions are also coming up in the BTC area, which is a positive sign, he added.
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