Bengal Chief Secy too refutes CAG findings on non-submission of utilisation certificates

Kolkata, Feb 9 (IANS) In line with the ruling Trinamool Congress in West Bengal, the Chief Secretary of the state, B.P. Gopalika, on Friday refuted the recent CAG findings on non- submission of utilisation certificates by the state government on fund utilisation under the different Centrally-sponsored schemes.

Speaking to mediapersons at the state secretariat Nabanna, Gopalika said that there is no reason to accept the CAG findings in the matter.

“The findings say that the utilisation certificates valued at Rs 2.29 lakh crore from eight state government departments had not been submitted. I think there has been a misunderstanding in the matter.

“It is actually a 20-year compiled report starting from the financial year 2002-03. So the report is actually a compilation of accounts for 20 years,” the Chief Secretary said.

Now, he added, the question is if the accounts are for 20 years, why the issue of non-submission of utilisation certificates is being raised after such a long time?

He also pointed out that Central field inspection teams come to the state regularly to review the performance of the crucial departments like that of panchayat affairs and rural development, health, among others.

“Whatever documents or information have been sought by such field inspection teams have already been provided to them. Nothing is pending at our end,” he added.

Earlier this month, Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee had written to Prime Minister Narendra Modi raising objections to the observations made in the State Finance Audit Report for 2020-21 of the CAG regarding non-submission of utilisation certificates.

In the letter, the Chief Minister had claimed that on scrutiny of the observations of the report, it was found that the state government departments concerned had submitted the utilisation certificates on time to the respective Union ministries in the prescribed format against the allocations/sanctions made under different Centrally-sponsored schemes.

–IANS

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