By our Staff Reporter

GUWAHATI, July 11: “There has been misutilization of government funds in the Agricultural department. The facilities have not reached the true beneficiaries. There are many schemes about which people are not even aware.” This was alleged by the Secretary General of the All Assam Shramik Kalyan Parishad, Pradip Kalita said here today.

 Kalita alleged that since the past four years, 2008 to 2012, several crores of funds were allocated under the State and Central government schemes, but very few have seen the light of the day.

“We had filed an RTI demanding the fund allocation under State and Central Government schemes for the Agricuture sector in the past four years. However, the result shows a poor picture of fund management which is quite unfortunate,” he said.

Talking to mediapersons, Kalita said there has been misutilization of funds under a total 31 schemes, namely, the Tribal Sub-plan, SC development, CM raincoat distribution schemes, Farmer’s award scheme, disaster management, fertiziler distribution, jute development to name a few.

“There are many who do not even know that there is a scheme for women welfare in agriculture. Where then has the fund been utilized?” questioned Kalita.

He further said that the State Government had allocated funds for jatropha cultivation, yet the districts of Assam do not cultivate jatropha. This shows a clear picture of the corruption taking place in the Agriculture department.

Criticizing the Agriculture minister, Kalita said, “ The Agriculture minister, Nilomoni Sen Deka is immersed neck deep in corruption. Instead of taking strict action against the corrupt officials, who have well been identified with proof, the minister instead is safeguarding them.”

Kalita minched no words to allege that the Agriculture minister, along with Agriculture Director, Kabindra Borkakoty have been trying to slowdown the CID investigation on the murder of Gadapani Pathak, an officer of the Agriculture department since he was fully aware of the corruption taking place in the said department.