Kolkata, Aug 25 (IANS): Against the backdrop of the three-tier panchayat elections in West Bengal scheduled next year, West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee is taking an apparent signal aiming to clean up the rural civic body system which had been frequently marred by severe accusations of corruption.
The chief minister has given the newly-appointed state Panchayat Affairs & Rural Development minister Pradip Majumdar, popular in the political circuit for this thorough untainted image, the additional charge of coordinating the functioning of seven other state government departments.
These state government departments, for functional flexibility, are required to maintain daily coordination with the state panchayat affairs & the rural development. These seven departments are food & supplies, agriculture, agriculture marketing, fisheries, irrigation and waterways, animal resources development and food processing & horticulture.
State panchayat affairs & rural development department sources said that in the new and extended role, Majumdar is expected to clean up and update the statement relating to expenditures incurred by all these departments as well as to ensure that these department affectively and diligently utilise the funds allotted to them under various heads.
"Because of this irregular maintenance of statements of expenditure there had been frequent complaints of corruption from different districts, which in due course hampered the next flow of fund allocation. In this process, often huge budgetary allocations to different departments remain unutilised in different districts by the end of the financial year concerned. At the same time, because of this irregular maintenance of statements of expenditures, often central funds under different centrally- sponsored schemes get blocked, which again hampers the rural development process. Majumdar, in this new role and with his vast experience in rural development affairs is expected to address these anomalies," said a senior official of the state panchayat affairs & rural development department.
To recall, since 2011 when Trinamool Congress came to power in West Bengal for the first time ousting the 34-year long Left Front rule, Majumdar acted the principal agriculture advisor to the chief minister. In the recent cabinet reshuffle, he was allotted the state panchayat affairs & rural development department.
Majumdar himself remained highly composed over his new assignment. "I am a soldier in the entire system and I will diligently try to fulfill my duties in whatever assignment given to me by the chief minister," he said.