Other States - Rajasthan   

Attack on social audit team flayed

JAIPUR: Political parties and civil rights groups here have condemned the attack on the workers of Rozgar Evum Suchana Ka Adhikar Abhiyan, holding a social audit on the National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme in Manohar Thana tehsil of Jhalawar district in Rajasthan. They alleged tacit support of the State Government in the attacks as well as in the initial reluctance on the part of local panchayat functionaries in extending cooperation to the social audit, a mandatory procedure under NREGA.

“The Government is trying to thwart a democratic process,” said Dushyant Ojha, Secretary of the Communist Party of India. “Social audits are the participatory part of democratic functioning. The Government in Rajasthan is only betraying its inherent despotic and authoritarian traits by trying to stop social audits in a public-oriented programme of the nature of NREGS,” he said.

The People’s Union for Civil Liberties (PUCL), Rajasthan, in a resolution expressed serious concern over the attacks on the activities of Right to Information and NREGS and non-cooperation of the local administration to the processes of social audit.

“In our view the State Government had a direct role in the attacks on the social audit activists in Banswara in December 2007 and now in Jhalawar. The Government does not want public scrutiny of NREGA work. The decision on the part of sarpanches and gram sevaks not to give information was not their own. The State Government and the Rural Development Department were behind the move,” said the resolution signed by Prem Krishna Sharma and Ramakant Saxena among others.

“The PUCL is of the view that the Rajasthan Government is not interested in carrying out any work under NREGS but wants to keep aside the money sanctioned meant for it as election fund. The Comptroller and Auditor General’s report too refers to the existence of corruption in the scheme,” the resolution noted. It demanded an enquiry by the Anti-Corruption Bureau into misuse of funds allocated for the scheme.

Two-dozen activist organisations, which met at Vinobha Gyan Mandir here on Wednesday, condemned the attack and deplored the stand of the authorities .

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