Discrimination between BJP-Sena MLAs over new fund distribution
Chief Minister Fadnavis has decided to distribute a whopping Rs 1,500 crores for development works despite no budget provision
Even though there is no provision in the budget, Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis in his own power has decided to distribute whopping amount of Rs 1,500 crores among members of legislative assembly (MLAs) from ruling the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and Shiv Sena for development work in their concerned constituencies.
The BJP legislators will receive Rs 10 crores each as special fund from Rural Development Department (RDD) whereas Sena MLAs will receive only Rs five crores. On the other hand, MLAs from opposition Congress and the NCP will not get a single penny for their constituencies.
Ahead of election year, the ruling BJP-Sena alliance government want to showcase development works by the MLAs in their constituencies to woo votes in the next Lok Sabha and state assembly polls. As a part of the strategy, it was decided to allocate Rs 10 crores each to BJP legislator and Rs five crores each to Sena legislator.
According to Sena insider, Sena MLAs have been told to submit proposals worth Rs five crores to Dada Bhuse, minister of state for RDD and Sena leader. Whereas the BJP MLAs are submitting their proposals to Pankaja Munde, minister for RDD and BJP leader.
Bhuse confirmed he is receiving proposals from Sena MLAs and the fund will be released once the provision will be made in next year’s budget. There are 123 BJP MLAs and 62 Sena MLAs. The state will need to allocate Rs 1,230 crores to distribute among BJP legislators whereas for Sena, the state will need to make provision of Rs 315 crores. The state will need to make total budget provision of Rs 1,545 crore.
Sudhir Mungantiwar, minister for finance and planning said, “We have make provision in next budget to allocate fund to legislators. We have asked the legislators to submit their proposals. We will distribute Rs two crores, Rs three crores and Rs five crores to the legislators depend upon number of villages included in his concern constituency.”
He further said, “We can
not allot Rs five or ten crore equally to the MLAs who have 300 villages or 200 villages in their concern constituencies. The development work will start next year and hence at this moment, we do not need to have fund for this work.”
When asked whether the government will distribute fund to the MLAs from opposition Congress-Nationlist Congress Party (NCP), Mungantiwar said, “We are following path of erstwhile Congress-NCP government. They had not given fund to us when we were in the opposition.”
Reacting on minister’s comment, Prithviraj Chavan, former chief minister said that he, being chief minister, had allotted Rs one crore to opposition when ruling Congress-NCP MLAs had been allotted Rs two crores. “We did not discriminate within ruling and opposition party legislators,” Chavan said.
Dhananjay Munde, leader of opposition in legislative council said, “It is an election agenda of the BJP government. They do not have money to begin the work. It is another jumla of this government and they are fooling people by making false assurance of development works.”