Shillong: Congress on Saturday alleged that the NPP-led Meghalaya Democratic Alliance government has ruined the state finances through poor fiscal mismanagement and scams in its five years of reign and termed the ruling combine major as “Non Performing Party”
Levelling the allegations, All India Congress Committee media coordination. Mathew Antony said the CAG report at the close of March 2021 showed that 215 Utilisation Certificates amounting to Rs 1765.86 crore remained outstanding in the books of the Accountant General. 62 projects in Meghalaya are piled up without achieving completion.
The Meghalaya Govt has suffered a loss of Rs 1166.89 crores because of cost escalation due to delays in completing the projects.
He added that in absolute monetary terms, the overall debt of Meghalaya has increased by 51.60 percent from Rs 8983.50 crore during 2016-17 to Rs 13,618.74 crore during 2020-21.
As a percentage of GSDP, the overall debt was 32.74 percent in 2016-17 but has increased considerably by almost eight-percentage points to 40.73 percent in 2020-21.
Talking about the coal issue, Mathew said that Judge B. P. Kataki in his report stated that “13 lakh metric tonnes of coal was illegally mined, transported and discovered which the state sought to pass off as coal mined prior to the imposition of the ban”.
“According to our calculations, the loss to the state exchequer from the illegal mining and transportation of coal is an estimated Rs 650 crores. Just imagine how many welfare schemes could have been funded from this money.,” Mathew said.
Meghalaya Pradesh Congress Committee Vice President Ronnie V Lyngdoh said if voted to power Congress will set up a State University for job-oriented and market-ready courses such as IOT (Internet of Things), Block Chain Technology, IT and ITES.
“To give a fillip to the tourism sector in Meghalaya, especially the service industry, our party will also develop a comprehensive plan through which local youths can be trained in a vocation of their choice, as per their educational and professional qualifications”, Lyngdoh added.
He said that the Congress in the state will elaborate on all these in its manifesto which will be released shortly.
