Govt to axe 500 schemes

The state government has decided to either merge or discontinue a large number of schemes that are similar in nature or which are not generating results as per expectations.

It has been found that out of 1,218 schemes in the Annual Development Plan (ADP), 2008-09, no budgetary provisions had been made for as many as 251 schemes while 323 schemes had continued with the same nomenclature since 1992-93. Of the later, 43 schemes had been provided a sum lower than what they had received 15 years back.

Highly-placed sources in the state government said, “The state government is planning to rationalise, close or merge the abovementioned over 500 schemes which are not generating expected results, in the upcoming ADP 2009-10. There are many schemes of similar nature of the Centre and State, having common objectives but varying funding patterns. There are many schemes with similar objectives of different departments, like housing projects of panchayat, rural development, urban, road & building, law and home departments. If these departments are interlinked, they can generate better results.

In some cases, within the same department, there are multiple schemes with common objectives, like six schemes of grant in-aid for construction of hostel buildings by the social welfare department.’’

Sources said, “The state government runs many schemes for poor but, surprisingly, it doesn’t have any universally accepted list of the poor.’’

These sources added, “The state government is likely to adopt the Andhra Pradesh model of convergence of self-employment schemes for generating maximum employment in rural areas and adopt Delhi model of mission convergence for focused development of urban areas. Delhi government has merged 42 schemes of nine departments, set nine goals which are to be monitored constantly. The whole process of execution of schemes is to be monitored by senior officials.’’