Dimapur, Jan. 13 (EMN): The Naga People's Front (NPF) on Sunday wondered if the state’s department of Rural Development had “given false data to the high level committee” in relation to the alleged misappropriation of grant-in-aid money.
“The apple of discord, in the very first place, was the delay in release of Grant-in-Aid and the subsequent claim of RD Department that it was released in the month of December 2018. The NPF would like to remind that the leader of opposition, TR Zeliang had raised the issue on 5th January 2019 at a press conference held at Dimapur after reports of non-receipt of the fund was authenticated from the deputy commissioners who also are the VDB chairman of their respective districts, viz. Dimapur, Peren and Mon.
“As reported by one of the local dailies, deputy commissioner of Peren district had confirmed the receipt of the fund only on 9th January 2019 and not in the month of December 2018 as claimed by the department officials. Now it would behove the association to clearly state the facts for general comprehension rather than giving piece-meal press release, which would only aggravate the issue and further confuse the public,” the NPF challenged.
Interestingly, the NPF claimed that it had confirmed from the “outgoing deputy commissioner of Dimapur, that he had received the fund in batches and not in a single demand draft on the 10th January 2019 which had complicated the process of disbursement to the respective VDBs under Dimapur district.”
“In regard to Mon district, it is clear that the fund had only been released to some of the blocks after 5th Janaury 2019 and not as claimed by the association. And the gutsy clarification and rebuttal by the RD department to the statement of the leader of opposition, TR Zeliang regarding the backlog years only corroborates our apprehension of the hand of RD officials along with the minister in-charge, in changing the high level committee’s allocation.
“When the statement of the leader of NPF legislature party is based on the records of the high level committee, where the years are plainly written, how can the nodal department who is responsible for feeding the data to the HLC contradict the years in question? This contradictory statement of the department gives rise to a pertinent question of whether the department had given false data to the high-level committee,” the statement read.
