After the visit, the director has promised resolve issues raised by the panchayats in 15 days time.
Pilernekar was assisted by BDO Uday Prabhudessai and two other BDOs in replying to the queries by the panchas and sarpanchas. Rachol Sarpanch Joseph Vaz, Curtorim Panch Santana Rodrigues and Paddem Sarpanch Deepak Kharangate attended the meeting.
Pilernekar was informed by the panchayat representatives that they have faced lot of hardships to get funds under 14th Finance Commission and several other allowances. “The guidelines of the 14th Finance Commission were not being understood by the junior engineers. Not one file of the 14th Finance commission works was passed,” said Joseph Vaz, Rachol sarpanch.
“If we do not spend the sanctioned money, then we won’t get the next instalment. This is because the Secretaries have no ideas on how to utilise the funds and hence we have asked the Director to give proper training and guidelines to the secretaries so that the money is utilised properly on time” Joseph said.
Responding to the complaints, the director said, “We have not received the Utilisation Certificates of the 1st instalments of the 14th Finance Commission funds and hence we have told the BDOs to complete the process at their end and report within 15 days.”
The director has also clarified that the Junior Engineers and the BDOs have the powers to execute the works upto Rs 2 lakh.
“Entire works in Salcete have stopped and we will be clearing them in 15 days,” the director said.
The Panchayats have now pinned their hopes on the commitment of the Director as there has been an undue delay in the utilisation of funds from South Goa especially Salcete areas.
