Hyderabad, March 14: In the last 19 years, money to the tune of Ra 21,000 crore from the SC sub plan funds for Andhra Pradesh, which should have been used for the development of the scheduled caste community, has never reached them, revealed K R Venugopal, retired bureaucrat and former secretary to Prime Minister of India.
Expressing concern at the diversion of funds earmarked for Scheduled Castes (SC) and Scheduled Tribes (ST), he said, “A part of the funds has been spent on outer ring roads, beautification of Hussainsagar, flyovers and other projects.” Venugopal was speaking at a media workshop organised by the Centre for Dalit Studies (CDS) in the city on Sunday on the implementation of Scheduled Castes Sub Plan. The guests at the workshop spoke at length on issues related to budget allocation for SCs and STs and its impact on their welfare.
Venugopal expressed concern over the growing disparity between the underdeveloped sections and the developed sections as a result of the inefficient usage of the funds allocated to them by the state and the central governments.
“A specific law should be introduced for the transparent usage of these funds as injustice is being done to the lower caste population for the last 50 years,” he said adding, “Some of the problems faced by dalits include high infant mortality rate, low literacy rates, high school-drop out rate, maternity deaths and poverty.” Sharing the details of his recent meeting with the chief minister, Venugopal put forward a few demands which would help in the betterment of these sections.
“I had submitted a representation to the chief minister on behalf of the CDS in which we demanded that Rs 4,000 crores be spent every year for the next five years to make up for the unspent Rs 21,000 crore of the fund. We appealed to the CM to pass a resolution and implement it immediately,” he said.
According to him, there is a need for the government to allocate a part of the fund to organisations working on dalit issues. “Funds should be provided to organisations like CDS in order to do research and conduct awareness programmes,” he said.
K Srinivas Reddy, senior journalist and secretarygeneral, IJU felt that the policies and benefits meant for the socially deprived sections were only on paper.
“Most of the government schools in villages consist of only SC, ST and BC students.
The teaching facilties is also poor. The conditions of welfare hostel are even more pathetic,” he said, adding that sometimes hostel students have to go hungry as a result of contractors not supplying food on time.
M Lakshmaiah, senior journalist, pointed out the discrimination existing in the villages. “In most of the villages, good water supply ends near Dalitwada. These areas do not have proper roads or electricity. Majority of the Dalits still live in utter poverty.” The speakers also felt that highlighting the flaws and mismanagement of these funds in the media would help in wider awareness among the public on this issue.
—Agencies