The Bihar government has asked the Centre to release Rs 1045 crore pending for Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act projects and Rs 3007 crore for Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojna (Gramin) in the state without delay.
Timely payment of wages to poor jobseekers is the fundamental guarantee under the MGNREGA Act, Bihar Rural Development minister Shrawan Kumar said.
In Bihar wage payment under the scheme is pending for more than three months in 168 blocks as the Centre has not released nearly Rs 1045 crore against wage liabilities and for carrying out other designated works under the scheme, he told PTI on Thursday.
Besides, delay in the release of Rs 3007 crore for PMAY by the Centre is adversely affecting the implementation of the scheme in rural areas, he asserted.
"I have repeatedly requested the Center to immediately release funds for the uninterrupted implementation of the PMAY-G scheme and payment to labourers under the MGNREGA and wrote several letters to Union Minister for Rural Development and Panchayati Raj, Giriraj Singh, in this regard. The state government released a huge amount from its own funds to manage the situation in the recent past", he said.
The Centre, he said, has so far released only Rs 791.42 crore under MGNREGA, while a total Rs 1823.92 crore of its share is pending since 2020-21. "We want immediate disbursal of Rs 1045 crore from the Center's fund to Bihar under MGNREGA the minister said.
Reacting to senior BJP leader Sushil Modi's recent allegation that Bihar ministers are trying to defame the Center to cover up their failures in utilizing properly central government funds for these two schemes, Kumar said, The BJP leader is unaware of the facts. We hardly pay attention to what he (Modi) says.
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