Congress legislator from Allahabad (North) Anugrah Narayan Singh is not the only MLA whose local area development fund remains unutilised due to “the negligence of the administration”.

In fact, of the 11 legislators in the district, fund of eight MLAs, including six from the BSP and one from Samajwadi Party, have not been utilised due to what they termed “the callous attitude” of the office of Chief Development Officer (CDO).

On August 8, Singh had sought permission from the Speaker of the Assembly, Sukhadeo Rajbhar, to surrender his local area development fund, saying that he has Rs 1.48 crore surplus in his fund as the administration was not clearing his development projects of his constituency.

Every MLA is given Rs 1.25 crore yearly for the development of his constituency and they have to send proposals to the office of CDO, which must clear them within 45 days. But sources said that the proposals were not cleared by the CDO within the stipulated time and in some cases, the proposals were not cleared even after the lapse of the financial year. Development work worth Rs 8 crore is being affected in the district due to the pending proposals, sources added.

The newly-appointed CDO, Rishikesh Yashod, said from now on all the proposals would be cleared in a very short period. “It was true that a lot of proposals were pending until I joined recently. Now, I have expedited the matter and soon all proposals would get the clearance,” Yashod said.

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