Guwahati, December 23 (The Telegraph): The Centre, under the Pradhan Mantri Gram Sadak Yojana, has rated the performance of five states of the Northeast as “poor” for the current year. The states which have been pulled up are Assam, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Nagaland and Tripura. The ministry of rural development has asked the erring states to carry out a special review of the programme and take appropriate measures to make good the shortfall. The states have failed to meet less than 80 per cent of their targets.
The ministry has started the performance rating from this year and looks at achievements in the first half (April to September). For instance, Assam, in the first half, was able to complete only 20.16 per cent of the target of road connectivity and spent just 40 per cent of the sanctioned amount. The target to connect habitations was 448, but the state was able to connect only 95 habitations with roads.
The primary objective of the scheme is to provide connectivity, by way of an all-weather road (with necessary culverts and cross-drainage structures, operational throughout the year), to the eligible unconnected habitations in the rural areas. The Pradhan Mantri Gram Sadak Yojana is a 100 per cent centrally-sponsored scheme. Similarly, Meghalaya was able to complete only 25 per cent of the roads in the stipulated time. A source said this is a scheme by which the states of the region can provide good connectivity to far-off rural areas.
“All support is being provided to the Northeast as the Centre is concerned about the connectivity problem,” the source said.
Mizoram was able to provide roads to only five of nine habitations identified for the project, while Nagaland was able to provide roads to only six habitations of the targeted 10. Tripura has been able to connect only 32 habitations with roads, instead of the targeted 115. The ministry said that in view of the huge expansion in the road construction programme in these states, advance planning was necessary to ensure adequate availability of materials within reasonable distance from the project sites.
The ministry has admitted that limited number of qualified contractors was a major constraint in almost all the states. A number of amendments have been made in the standard bidding document, including relaxation in the qualifying financial turnover criteria and participation by joint ventures, to increase the availability of qualified contractors.
