Sehore: The rural development department has decided to adopt a tough stance against persons who have taken benefits of the PM Awas Yojana though they were not eligible for it. The department has decided to realise the amount of the first installment, credited to the bank accounts of such beneficiaries.
Sources say that hundreds of ineligible persons had put up applications under the scheme and they were included in the list of beneficiaries. However, after a door-to-door survey it was realised that they had given wrong information in their applications. As many as 129 such ineligible families have been identified. The first installment of Rs 40,000 has been already credited to their accounts and now it had been decided to realise it from them. The total amount involved is Rs 49.20 lakh. More than 25 families have already returned the amount.
There is a 13-point guideline for identifying eligible beneficiaries. Only a person fulfilling all criterion listed in the guidelines are eligible for getting benefits under the scheme. But many persons, owning pucca houses and tractors and those whose family members were in government service, had also applied and were declared eligible. The fallout is that while the ineligible persons have been able to get the benefits of the scheme, the needy have been left out.
Of the ineligible families, the highest – 62 – are from CM Shivraj Singh’s assembly constituency Budhni, 15 are from Ashta, 16 from Icchawar and 13 from Nasrullaganj.
A target for construction of 12,747 houses has been fixed under the scheme for the fiscal year 2017-18. The district panchayat claims that 748 houses have already been constructed. Collector Tarun Kumar Pithode has told the officials of the district panchayat that they should better expedite the process of implementation of the scheme or face the music.
