Union Budget 2013: More greens to contain red rage

BHUBANESWAR: Twenty districts of Odisha, many of which are Maoist-affected, stand to gain from the increased allocation of money for the centrally-sponsored Backward Regions Grant Fund (BRGF).
Finance minister P Chidambaram on Thursday while presenting the 2013-14 Budget announced Rs 11,500 crore for BRGF and Rs 1,000 crore for the Left Wing extremism-affected districts in the country.
BRGF is one of the development measures initiated in nearly 88 districts identified in different states including Odisha where chronic backwardness has spawned Maoists to flourish. Depending on the population, each district gets between Rs 16 and Rs 32 crore per annum for undertaking various development projects. The Centre last year had sanctioned Rs 340 crore for the state under BRGF. This apart, the BRGF districts also annually get about Rs 1 crore each for capacity building of panchayati raj institutions.
Official sources said, many of the BRGF districts - Balangir, Deogarh, Gajapati, Ganjam, Kalahandi, Kandhamal, Keonjhar, Koraput, Malkangiri, Mayurbhanj, Nabarangpur, Nuapada, Rayagada, Sambalpur, Subarnapur, Sundargarh, Boudh, Dhenkanal, Jharsuguda, Bargarh - are Maoist-hit. Among them, some of the districts fall under the Kalahandi-Balangir-Koraput (KBK) region, which is widely known as one of country's endemic poverty zones. Sources further said BRGF districts are also covered by another scheme called Integrated Action Plan (IAP), under which an estimated Rs 30 crore is sanctioned for each district to focus on development of infrastructure.
Odisha government last year had lodged a strong protest with the Centre on reports that the latter was planning to merge both BRGF and IAP.
Chief minister NaveenPatnaik took up the matter with Union home minister S K Shinde and stressed on continuing both the programmes in the greater interest of the people, particularly in extremist-hit areas. Officials here, however, said though the Centre has not merged the two schemes, there had been elements of confusion in implementation of both the BRGF and the IAP.
While presenting the Budget, Chidambaram described the BRGF a 'vital source of gap funding' and announced involvement of a 'state component' in it. "The BRGF will include a state component for Bihar, the Bundelkand region, West Bengal, the KBK districts of Odisha and the 82 districts under the Integrated Action Plan. The present criteria for determining backwardness are based on terrain, density of population and length of international borders. It may be more relevant to use a measure like the distance of the state from the national average under criteria such as per capita income, literacy and other human development indicators. I propose to evolve new criteria and reflect them in future planning and devolution of funds," he added.
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