Activists at the
ongoing mazdoor satyagraha near the Statue Circle here have demanded
that the government first initiate action on complaints of anomalies
which emerged during the audit of NREGS in the state and thereby set an
example of a transparent system before discussing about the virtues of
the rural employment scheme at the collectors’ conference here.
They handed over a
letter to chief minister Ashok Gehlot on Tuesday, pointing out at the
lack of action by the government on numerous cases of anomalies. The
letter was an outcome of a daylong scrutiny of various audit papers of
NREGS at the camp site by the activists.
“The recent special
audit of work under MGNREGS in 31 panchayats have thrown up evasion of
Rs 28 crore as VAT but till date no action has been initiated by the
government to recover it. Atleast 10 FIRs were proposed against various
people but so far only five have been lodged. Similarly, 28 of these
sarpanches were to be declared unfit while a sum of Rs 5.58 crore was to
be recovered from them but nothing much has happened in any of the
cases. Just Rs 80.15 lakh has been received. So, where is the government
following an answerable system which it is urging its bureaucrats to
follow,” asked Nikhil Dey, an activist.
The memorandum to
Gehlot also points out at the special audits in two gram panchayats —
Sapotara in Karauli and Soniyana in Chittorgarh — by the collectors.
So far, no money has
been recovered nor any action been initiated against the sarpanches
there. In a report by the district collector of Ajmer on the NREGS audit
of the gram panchayat of ‘Malanton Ki Weir,’ the anomalies detected
were only to the tune of Rs 57,000 whereas the state audit revealed
anomalies of Rs 1.31 crore. Still, no action has been initiated against
the erring official.
“The government is
always quick on pouncing on non-government persons whenever it finds the
reason but it seldom acts against government officials. There were many
collectors and other officials who were found to be involved in gross
anomalies in the purchase of computers with NREGA money but even after a
year nothing has been done against them,” Dey said.
He also alleged that
the audit process of NREGA done in August this year was merely an
eyewash as all the proceedings were passed by the gram sabha even after
there was no quorum for the meeting. “Even members of the audit team
were not present when the entire proceedings was passed. Therefore, the
government should first ensure that it follows the way to a transparent
rule and then ask its people to tread that way,” Dey added.