Benefits under NESIDS: Assam Seems to Miss the Boat

Staff Reporter

GUWAHATI, Sept 12: What has gone awry with Dispur that it has not been able to send adequate number of feasible proposals for schemes under NESIDS (North East Special Infrastructure Development Schemes) to the Ministry of DoNER? The situation is fraught with the risk of Assam missing benefits under NESIDS that has a time stipulation of March 2020.

Since the Ministry of DoNER is not sanctioning any more schemes under the NLCPR (Non-Lapsable Central Pool of Resources) in the Northeast, it sanctions schemes under NESIDS for the States in the region. While the funding pattern of schemes under NLCPR is 90:10 (90 per cent by the Centre and 10 per cent by the State concerned), schemes under NESIDS are 100 per cent centrally-funded ones. However, the ongoing schemes under NLCPR are still under 90:10 funding pattern. For the eight north-eastern States, the DoNER has allocated Rs 1,600 crore for schemes under NESIDS– the share of Assam being Rs 416.76 crore.

Assam alone getting a lion’s share – more than a-fourth of the total funding of Rs 1,600 crore under NESIDS for the eight States in the region – does not seem to be a boon for the State as its various departments have not been able to send feasible scheme proposals under NESIDS, so far. The policy adopted by DoNER is such that all schemes under NESIDS have to be completed, including clearance of bills, by March 2020. As things go as of now, Assam is fraught with missing the benefits under NESIDS that are too good to miss.

The performance of Assam on the ground is that – it has sent only nine NESIDS scheme proposals to the DoNER and of them only one scheme has been sanctioned, four others have been retained and three proposals have been rejected. The only sanctioned scheme from Assam is the Rs 77 crore three-lane railway overbridge in Jorhat. The four scheme proposals that have been retained are – a Rs 28.74 crore water supply project in Tinsukia (phase 3), a Rs 69.74 crore RCC bridge construction over the Aai Nadi in lower Assam, a Rs 23 crore project for improvement of special infrastructure development of JSB Civil Hospital in Chirang and a Rs 22.57 crore infrastructure development of greater Kheroni piped water supply project in Karbi Anglong.

The nodal department at Dispur that deals with schemes under NESIDS is Transformation & Development (T&D) Department, formerly known as Planning & Development (P&D) Department. Even as the department keeps on asking various other departments in the State to send feasible proposals for schemes under NESID, the departments concerned have not been able to send proposals worth enough to be sanctioned by the DoNER. What has gone wrong with the departments? Aren’t they in sync with the shifting from NLCPR to NESIDS? Each and every project under NESIDS has to be of above Rs 20 crore.