90% DMF fund not spent in Odisha
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03/04/2018
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Pioneer (Bhubaneswar)
The District Mineral Foundations (DMFs) in the State have collected Rs 4,075 crore in the last three years, while only Rs 389 crore was spent over the period. Thus, 90 per cent of the fund lies unutilized.
This was stated by Minister Usha Devi in a question of Dilip Ray in the Assembly recently.
In the tribal prone Sundargarh district, while Rs 748 crore was collected in the last three years, only Rs 103 crore was spent. This proves the lackadaisical attitude of the district administration in taking up development activities from the DMF collection.
According to the information of the Minister, the DMF collections in various districts in 2015-16 was Rs 395.38 crore, in 2016-17, Rs 2109.89 crore and in 2017-18, Rs 1,670.31 crore. But the expenditure was paltry Rs 389.27 crore over the period.
In as many as 17 districts, not a single pie was spent while in six districts, the expenditure was between Rs 1 crore and Rs 4 crore.
In the DMF of Keonjhar district while Rs 1,467.89 crore was collected in three years, only Rs 125.98 crore was spent. Similarly, in Angul district, Rs 829.41 crore was collected and Rs 55 crore was spent. In Jajpur district, the DMF collection was Rs 458 crore and expenditure was Rs 15 crore, in Jharsuguda, collection was Rs 480 crore, expenditure Rs 31 crore, in Koraput, collection Rs 81 crore, expenditure Rs 29 crore and in Rayagada district, the DMF received a collection of Rs 57 crore whereas only Rs 21 crore was spent.
Notably, the DMFs have been set up at the district level as per the provision of the Odisha Mineral Foundation Act, 2015 for the benefit of the mining affected people of the area. At present, a whopping Rs 3,786.33 DMF collection lis unspent.