STATES USING LESS THAN 50 PER CENT OF FUNDS FOR MINORITY

According to information revealed through the Right to Information Act, during the last five-year plan (2007-12), State Governments have not used even half the money the Union Government provided them for the Multi-sectoral Development Programme (MsDP). MsDP is an area development programme which includes several schemes, targeted for minorities living in 90 Minority Concentrated Districts (MCDs) across the country. District with at least 25 per cent of the minority population are categorised as MCD.  According to the RTI information accessed by Sayed Anwar Kaifi, different State Governments have used only Rs. 48.2 per cent of the total money released to them by the Union Ministry for Minority Affairs (MMA) till February 29 this year. As many as 12 of the 20 states have used less than 50 per cent of the funds, with few states using as low as 20 per cent. In total, the Centre had allocated Rs. 3780.4 crore for the MsDP, of which Rs. 2667.76 crore was released to State governments which in turn used till February 29 just Rs. 1287.3 crore (around 48.2 per cent). States which used less than 50 per cent of the funds include Uttarakhand, Sikkim, Arunachal Pradesh, Mizoram, Karnataka, Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, Assam, Bihar, Meghalaya, Kerala, Maharashtra and Jammu and Kashmir. Karnataka, Mizoram, Uttarakhand, Sikkim and Arunachal Pradesh could not use even 30 per cent of the funds.