Cong minister to inspect welfare projects in Hardoi

After the formation of the committee,Jain will be the first minister to do a spot-check of the central schemes in rural areas of the state.

The committee was formed on the instructions of the party high command to monitor 16 centrally funded schemes in Uttar Pradesh. State Congress president Rita Bahuguna Joshi is its convener and all the six Union ministers from UP – Pradeep Jain,Salman Khurshid,Beni Prasad Verma,Jitin Prasada,RPN Singh and Shri Prakash Jaiswal – are members. Other members include AICC general secretary Digvijaya Singh,CLP leader Pramod Tiwari and MLC Naseeb Pathan.

Asked about the visit,Jain told The Indian Express,“It is important to check whether the benefits given by the central government are actually reaching the beneficiaries at the grassroots level. We do not wish to target anyone. The motive is to just do a spot check of the implementation of rural development schemes funded by the Centre,especially MGNREGA,Pradhan Mantri Gramin Sarak Yojana,etc.,in the region.” Such visits would become more frequent,he added.

The district unit of the party is already busy preparing for Jain’s visit and collecting data on the anomalies and corrupt practices over the past few years.

Ajay Singh,district Congress committee president in Hardoi,said,“Hardoi is one of the worst districts in terms of implementation of welfare schemes. It was one of the initial districts to be chosen for NREGA across the country in 2006,but in the past few years things have become worse. Corruption has risen to such a level that a single rural road is shown to be constructed from different funds in government records and the condition of the road still remains the same.”

Jain admitted that after Naresh Agarwal left the party in the late 1990s to join SP and then BSP,the Congress wanted to regain ground in the region. For the past few years,the area has been a stronghold of SP and BSP.