Shillong, Jan 30: Missing of over Rs 43 crore sanctioned by the Centre and meant for Covid related expenditure in the state was highlighted by RTI activist Disparsing Rani during a press conference on Monday.
Rani said as per the reply to the RTI query, received on January 20, the union ministry of health and family welfare mentioned that it had released Rs 15.61 crore under phase I and Rs 104.12 crore under phase II for Meghalaya.
According to the RTI activist, the Health Minister James Sangma had replied in the Assembly during the last session in September that the state government had received only Rs 76 core from the central government.
James had said out of over Rs 816 crore, the state alone had spent over Rs 739 while over Rs 76 crore was from the Centre.
This contradicts the reply of the Centre to the RTI query that Meghalaya had received Rs 119 crore under the first and second phase, he pointed out.
“Therefore, this indicated that the health department of the government of Meghalaya had misused the fund of Rs 43 crore sanctioned by the Central government”, he said.
Meghalaya-Manipur contrast
Rani pointed out that James had said in the Assembly in September that Rs 816 crore was spent by the state government for 96,785 confirmed cases and as ex-gratia for 1624 persons who died. “But when we compare with Manipur government even though there was 1.4 lakh cases and 2149 deaths, only Rs 78 crore was the expenditure”, he said.
Rani had sought information from the state government on the expenditure incurred by the Centre but it was not provided by the state.
Moreover, he had asked for the status of payment of Rs 50,000 each to the relatives of those had died of Covid but this was also rejected.
