Kochi corp finishes last in plan fund expenditure with 48%

Kochi: Kochi corporation finished last in plan fund expenditure in the state as the financial year ended on Tuesday. The corporation, with a total outlay of Rs 98 crore, spent only 48% of the allocated funds.The corporation was placed second with 43% spending a few days ago. As other local bodies completed more works and submitted the bills to the state treasury before the deadline, they improved the progress of projects in the last few days. "Kochi corporation is lagging in the allocation of project funds, ranking last among the six corporations. It is the mismanagement and administrative failures of UDF governing council that led to such a situation. During the stint of previous LDF administration, Kochi corporation ranked first. However, after UDF came to power, there was a lack of proper monitoring and intervention, which was needed to fully utilise the project funds. If proper review meetings were conducted periodically, better implementation of plan fund projects could have been ensured," said K A Sreejith, opposition leader, corporation. "The corporation authorities' apathy paved the way for lapsing crores of rupees allocated to the local body. UDF governing council is hindering welfare and development by failing to spend the allocated funds for the city's development and the welfare of marginalised groups. The ruling front needs to end such irresponsible attitudes and mismanagement," he added. According to corporation authorities, the local body could not perform well due to lack of fund release. "Normally, the funds allocated under the plan fund scheme are disbursed in three phases. However, state govt didn't release the third instalment, which hampered our project implementation. We completed the work using the funds allocated to us in the first two instalments almost a month ago. For instance, we spent Rs 2.4 crore allotted to us for projects for the welfare of Scheduled Castes," mayor V K Minimol said. The finance standing committee members of the corporation claimed that the local body could not do much to improve performance due to reasons beyond its control. "State govt put curbs on clearing treasury bills. There was a ceiling of Rs 1 lakh a day to clear the bills. That's why the corporation was unable to fully spend the allocated funds," said M G Aristotle, member of the finance standing committee. "Moreover, corporation officials have been busy with election duties for the past few weeks. It is in the last few weeks of the financial year that most of the work is completed and bills are cleared. The absence of employees to process the bills at the peak time also affected our plan fund implementation and expenditure," Aristotle said.