Health spend a sorry figure
KOLKATA: Chief minister Mamata Banerjee, who is also the health minister, has spent barely half of the state's allocation for health.
According to figures compiled by the state health department and submitted to the finance department, the Trinamool Congress-run government has only spent Rs 698 crore of the Rs 1,410 crore allocated by the Planning Commission for 2012-'13.
In 2012, the commission had approved an annual plan of Rs 25,910 crore for Bengal. The allocation, increased by 16% from last year, was projected as a shot in the arm for the government, though Mamata herself was silent on it.
Insiders said the chief minister was aware that the allocation had been okayed on the basis of what the government had submitted before the plan panel. Therefore, it was clear that Mamata had planned to spend Rs 1,410 crore on health projects. The Rs 698 crore spent so far was needed for strengthening hospitals and block primary health care centres, creating newborn care corners, mother and child welfare and on providing modern facilities.
With only a month of the last quarter remaining, officials said they would barely cross the halfway mark.
The chief minister is believed to have expressed her displeasure over the slow progress of projects funded by the centre's backward region grants fund in the health department. Sources said she had pulled up officials for the delay in working on the 33 super-speciality hospitals in the districts. She then set an "impossible deadline of March 2013", the sources added.
"Even if the state government manages to provide its own contribution, the central funds will take time to arrive. It will be impossible to finish projects by March, 2013," said an official.
National Rural Health Mission director Sanghamitra Ghosh had recently written to chief secretary Sanjay Mitra that central funds of Rs 6.73 crore earmarked for rural health upgrade was lying unspent. Add to this is a corpus of Rs 5.86 crore lying unspent with 909 primary health centres across the state. Ghosh wrote that the unspent amount lying in the districts was higher than the annual entitlements and that the administration must take necessary steps to expedite utilization.
At the beginning of the fiscal, the chief minister had talked about upgrading 27 hospitals in 11 backward districts to super-speciality hospitals as the Planning Commission approved the detailed project reports related to 27 sub-divisional and rural hospitals and block primary health centres. The figure was later revised to 33, but the funds management was apparently glossed over. Even as the Centre had released 30% of the amount at the beginning of the fiscal, the backup work was left pending.
That was the first time the Centre had sanctioned funds for a special project in Bengal since Mamata came to power. Officials said the delay caused by the wait for the Bengal government's project reports had come in the way of funds.
But now it appears that even after getting this kind of a fiscal boost, the government - which had tabled a bigger budgetary allocation to the health sector - has cut a sorry figure.
According to figures compiled by the state health department and submitted to the finance department, the Trinamool Congress-run government has only spent Rs 698 crore of the Rs 1,410 crore allocated by the Planning Commission for 2012-'13.
In 2012, the commission had approved an annual plan of Rs 25,910 crore for Bengal. The allocation, increased by 16% from last year, was projected as a shot in the arm for the government, though Mamata herself was silent on it.
Insiders said the chief minister was aware that the allocation had been okayed on the basis of what the government had submitted before the plan panel. Therefore, it was clear that Mamata had planned to spend Rs 1,410 crore on health projects. The Rs 698 crore spent so far was needed for strengthening hospitals and block primary health care centres, creating newborn care corners, mother and child welfare and on providing modern facilities.
With only a month of the last quarter remaining, officials said they would barely cross the halfway mark.
The chief minister is believed to have expressed her displeasure over the slow progress of projects funded by the centre's backward region grants fund in the health department. Sources said she had pulled up officials for the delay in working on the 33 super-speciality hospitals in the districts. She then set an "impossible deadline of March 2013", the sources added.
"Even if the state government manages to provide its own contribution, the central funds will take time to arrive. It will be impossible to finish projects by March, 2013," said an official.
National Rural Health Mission director Sanghamitra Ghosh had recently written to chief secretary Sanjay Mitra that central funds of Rs 6.73 crore earmarked for rural health upgrade was lying unspent. Add to this is a corpus of Rs 5.86 crore lying unspent with 909 primary health centres across the state. Ghosh wrote that the unspent amount lying in the districts was higher than the annual entitlements and that the administration must take necessary steps to expedite utilization.
At the beginning of the fiscal, the chief minister had talked about upgrading 27 hospitals in 11 backward districts to super-speciality hospitals as the Planning Commission approved the detailed project reports related to 27 sub-divisional and rural hospitals and block primary health centres. The figure was later revised to 33, but the funds management was apparently glossed over. Even as the Centre had released 30% of the amount at the beginning of the fiscal, the backup work was left pending.
That was the first time the Centre had sanctioned funds for a special project in Bengal since Mamata came to power. Officials said the delay caused by the wait for the Bengal government's project reports had come in the way of funds.
But now it appears that even after getting this kind of a fiscal boost, the government - which had tabled a bigger budgetary allocation to the health sector - has cut a sorry figure.
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