Splashing out

Despite the widespread reservations about the scheme,the Member of Parliament Local Area Development Scheme (MPLADS) has been put on steroids by the Centre — in fact,the corpus has been more than doubled to Rs 5 crore per MP per year.

It’s a contentious subject — although,in concept,MPLADS sounds like a great idea to give legislators a sense of stake and real investment in their constituencies,an incentive to see the House last its full term. When the scheme was introduced by Narasimha Rao in 1993,it was envisaged as a way of letting legislators identify and channel funds towards public works,enabling them to respond as and when they perceive a need in their constituency. Then,each MP was allocated a sum to sanction spending on small projects like drinking water facilities,primary education,public health sanitation and roads. Over the years,as the amount allocated has risen,MPLADS and MLALADS have drawn serious criticism from several quarters. In 2002,the CAG found several indiscretions and cases of funds being diverted for purposes other than what they were intended for. And this scheme may not be the ideal way to fund those needs in the first place — it has been observed by the Planning Commission that maintenance costs are not often factored in when MPs splash out on assets or infrastructure,that projects are sanctioned in an irregular fashion,and often run into delays. What’s more,this work bleeds into the adminstration’s role,and pushes the legislator into executive functions,rather than monitoring implementation and delivery.

The Second Administrative Reforms Commission had warned that these funds “seriously erode the notion of separation of powers,as the legislator directly becomes the executive”,and the NAC has also suggested doing away with the scheme. The Centre was confronted with the choice of either scrapping the scheme altogether,or reinvigorating it with more money. Now that the government has chosen to repose its faith in the scheme,the least we can hope is some remedial action — and a serious undertaking to plug gaps,as Nitish Kumar is attempting in Bihar.