Sunday, March 15, 2009

Implementation of Central projects in Nagaland poor: CAG

KOHIMA, March 14: The implementation of projects, funded under a special central assistance in Nagaland, was poor due to inadequate planning, according to the latest CAG reports.

Pointing out projects were selected without detailed survey to identify the infrastructural gaps, the CAG reports tabled in the State Assembly said perspective plans were not prepared and concept papers in respect of 37 out of 50 projects funded under non-lapsable central pool of resources (NLCPR) till March last year were not prepared.

NLCPR is a pool of fund set up by the Centre from the unspent balance of the 10 per cent provided in the budget of central ministries and department for member states of North Eastern Council (NEC). This fund is distributed to NE states by the Union DoNER Ministry on 90:10 sharing basis as per proposals made by respective state.

The report said financial management was deficient and the State Government had not released its matching share (10 per cent) to the implementing agencies resulting in delay in execution of works.
Monitoring and evaluation mechanism remained grossly inefficient which had already affected the pace of implementation of the projects, the report observed.

In Nagaland, 60 projects at a cost of Rs 836.57 crore were approved by the DoNER Ministry during 1998-2008. Of these, 10 projects involving Rs 118.09 crore relating to roads and bridges were handed over to Border Roads Organization (BRO) for execution.

The remaining 50 projects costing Rs 718.48 crore were implemented by 12 departments of the State against which Rs 507.26 crore were released by the Centre and the State Government.
The CAG report said the State Government deducted in an unauthorised way Rs 3.40 crore during 2003-08 as ‘departmental charges’ out of the funds allotted under 10 projects executed by five implementing agencies, but a scrutiny revealed that there was no provision for deduction of such charges.

Construction of four km road was awarded and paid to two different contractors resulting in excess payment of Rs 3.17 crore, the report said.
The 22.92 MW thermal power plant at Dimapur had been abandoned after incurring an expenditure of Rs 32 crore for construction of building and procurement of machinery and equipment which were lying unutilized at project site.

On implementation of National Rural Health Mission (NMHR) in Nagaland, the CAG said the mid-term review of the mission implementation for the period 2005-08 was not encouraging due to non-completion of household and facility survey and non-identification of the gaps in rural healthcare.

There was a shortfall in the creation of infrastructure and inadequate number of medical officers, medicines and equipment, and this was further compounded by non-release of state share of funds and non-existence of monitoring mechanism in the department, the report said.

Although NRHM was launched all over the country in April 2005 for seven year period (2205-12), the programme was started in Nagaland in February 2006 without preparing a perspective plan (2005-12) and surveying households and healthcare facility across the State, the report revealed. (PTI)

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