UPA pumping more funds to Bihar than NDA regime: Rahguvansh

Patna, Apr 21 (UNI) Union Rural Development Minister Raghuvansh Prasad Singh today claimed the UPA government was pumping more funds into Bihar for welfare schemes than what the erstwhile NDA government had done.

Addressing mediapersons here, Mr Singh said the UPA govenment had released sufficient funds for execution of various welfare schemes, including National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (NRGES), but the Nitish Kumar government could not use the funds properly. The UPA government had released Rs 5739.29 crore for Bihar during 2004-2007 while the NDA government had provided only Rs 1877.88 crore against such schemes to the state during 2001-04, he added.

Referring to wide-spread unrest over irregularities in the BPL list in Bihar, he alleged that Nitish government was responsible for the ''fuss'', as it did not follow the directives of the Centre in this regard.

The Centre had directed the Bihar government to paste the BPL list at community places such as block offices and Panachayat Bhawans to enable the people of the concerned areas to check its veracity but the NDA government did not pay any heed to it.

''There was no hue and cry over the BPL list in other states where the Centre's directive in this regard were complied with,'' he added.

Mr Singh said Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Gujarat and Maharashtra had utlised Rs 100 crore in each district where the Centre's sponsored employment guarantee scheme had been launched but Bihar could not utilise more than Rs 25 crore in any district which was covered under this scheme.

Refuting to allegations by the NDA that the Centre was indifferent towards the issue of poverty alleviation in Bihar, he said the erstwhile Vajpayee government had identified 90 lakh families in undivided Bihar.

After the division of Bihar on November 15, 2000, Jharkhand with a population of 2.69 crore, was allowed to receive allocation for poverty alleviation programmes for 35 lakh BPL families from the Centre while residual Bihar with population of eight crore was permitted to receive assistance for this scheme for 55 lakh families only.

''The UPA government, after thorough consideration, increased the figure to 66 lakh BPL families for Bihar under this scheme,'' Mr Singh claimed.

When asked about his abusive remarks against the Bihar Chief Minister during a press meet yesterday, Mr Singh said there was nothing abusive in it, adding this was only a proverb. He said he had used such kind of expressions following false allegations levelled against the Centre by NDA leaders about its non-cooperation in development of Bihar.

UNI