The Ministry of Panchayati Raj implements the Backward Regions Grant Fund (BRGF) in 250 backward districts of the country. Under the BRGF, untied funds are given to Panchayats through the State Governments to meet critical and other infrastructure gaps. Other schemes for the development of villages are implemented by the Ministry of Rural Development, Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, Department of School Education and Literacy and the Department of Drinking Water Supply among others. The norms for distribution of BRGF Grants at various levels are as follows:

 

Distribution between the Capacity Building (CB) and the Development Grant (DG) components:

 

The Ministry provides the CB Grants to the 27 States computed @Rs. 1 crore per BRGF district which totals to Rs. 250 crore per annum. The remaining amount of the annual BRGF allocation is available towards the DG component.

 

Distribution of the Development Grants (DG) between districts:

 

      The Ministry notifies the annual entitlement of each of the 250 districts under the DG component based on the following formula:

(i)                Every district will receive a fixed base amount of Rs.10 crore per annum.

(ii)             50% of the balance allocation under the Scheme is allocated on the basis of the share of the population of the district in the total population of all backward districts.

(iii)           The remaining 50% is distributed on the basis of the share of the area of the district in the total area of all backward districts.

 

       Distribution of the Development Grants (DG) among the Panchayats and the ULBs within the districts:

Each State is required to indicate the normative formula that would be used for the allocation of BRGF funds to each Panchayat and ULB. The normative formula should consider:

 

(i)                The share of each local self-government institution category      (Panchayats or Municipalities) within the district,

(ii)             Within the overall allocation made for each category, the norms governing the inter-se share of each Panchayat or Municipality concerned.

           

The Ministry of Rural development also implements through the State Government and UT Administrations the major schemes namely Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA), Swarnjayanti Gram Swarozgar Yojana (SGSY)/ National Rural Livelihood Mission (NRLM), Indira Awas Yojana (IAY), Pradhan Mantri Gram Sadak Yojana (PMGSY), National Social Assistance Programme (NSAP), Integrated Watershed Management Programme (IWMP).  Out of these programmes, the allocation based schemes are SGSY/ NRLM and IAY whereas other schemes are demand/ project based and allocation is not made to any of the States.  The allocation to the States under SGSY and IAY is made as per the criteria approved by the Planning Commission of India for the respective programmes which are as under:

           

            SGSY:  The funds under Swarnjayanti Gram Swarojgar Yojana (SGSY) are allocated on the basis of poverty ratio in the respective States.

           

            IAY:  The allocation to the States is made taking into account 25% weightage to poverty ratio and 75% to shortage of houses in the respective State.

           

Both the schemes i.e. SGSY and IAY are for the BPL rural households.

 

MGNREGA

The objective of the Act is to enhance livelihood security in rural areas by providing at least 100 days of guaranteed wage employment in a financial year to every household whose adult members volunteer to do unskilled manual work.  MGNREGA covers the entire country with the exception of districts that have a hundred percent urban population.

 

Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan (SSA)

The allocation of resources will depend on the following: preparation of District Elementary Education Plans and their appraisal; commitment of the State government with regard to the State share; performance of the Planning, Appraisal and Fund Flow Mechanisms, institutional reforms in States to facilitate decentralized management of education and as per RTE requirements; reports of supervision teams regarding the quality of programme implementation; and availability of financial resources in a particular year. The actual allocation of resources will depend on all these factors. It is likely that districts with poor infrastructure will require more resources. However, the release will also be performance linked. If an educationally backward district does not utilize the resources in the manner intended, it is unlikely to continue to receive a priority.

 

National Rural Health Mission (NRHM)

• The National Rural Health Mission seeks to provide effective healthcare to rural population throughout the country with special focus on 18 states, which have weak public health indicators and/or weak infrastructure.

 

• These 18 States are Arunachal Pradesh, Assam, Bihar, Chhattisgarh, Himachal Pradesh, Jharkhand, Jammu & Kashmir, Manipur, Mizoram, Meghalaya, Madhya Pradesh, Nagaland, Orissa, Rajasthan, Sikkim, Tripura, Uttaranchal and Uttar Pradesh.

 

            Its goals are reduction in Infant Mortality Rate (IMR) and Maternal Mortality

Ratio (MMR) Universal access to public health services such as Women’s health, child health, water, sanitation & hygiene, immunization, and Nutrition.

 

The Mission is conceived as an umbrella programme subsuming the existing programmes of health and family welfare, including the RCHII, National Disease Control Programmes for Malaria, TB, Kala Azar, Filaria, Blindness & Iodine Deficiency and Integrated Disease Surveillance Programme.

 

National Rural Drinking Water Programme (NRDWP)

           

The Ministry of Drinking Water & Sanitation administers through the States the centrally sponsored scheme, National Rural Drinking Water Programme (NRDWP) for providing financial and technical assistance to the States to supplement their efforts to provide drinking water to the rural areas.  The criteria for allocation of funds under NRDWP is given in the Statement below.

 

 

The BRGF districts including the 34 districts of Uttar Pradesh covered under the programme were selected on the basis of the report of the Inter-Ministry Task Group (IMTG) on Redressing Growing Regional Imbalances constituted by the Planning Commission in 2005. 

        

            The above information was given by the Minister of  Panchayati Raj Shri V. Kishore Chandra Deo   in the Rajya Sabha today.

 

 

MC/ls