Govt to get KALIA fund back from ineligibles

Bhubaneswar: Following media reports that ministers and ineligible beneficiaries have received the benefit under KALIA (Krushak Assistance for Livelihood and Income Augmentation) scheme, the state government Thursday clarified that it will get back fund in case of any error.

There are media reports that names of influential persons including ministers Niranjan Pujari, Bikram Keshari Arukh and Sushant Singh were there in the list. Rejecting the allegations, Cooperation secretary Krishnan Kumar said no money has been sent to any of the three ministers. Their names have appeared in the draft list. But, it was not there in the final beneficiary list, he said.

On transfer of Re 1 to some farmers, Agriculture Secretary Saurabh Garg said, “Some beneficiary has received only Re 1 instead of Rs 5,000. That was done for test check of our DBT system in collaboration with the bank. In fact, out of the list of 22 lakh farmers, about 7 lakh were remitted Re 1 to check that if it bounced-back.” He also stated that Rs 5,000 has been credited to the bank accounts of the beneficiaries whose names figured in the final list.

The government had published a draft list of 22 lakh beneficiaries January 1 as per the DBT list the state was having, he said, adding, “We had asked ineligible people for exclusion through Red Form. Later, those who are government employees or owners of above 5 acres of farmland, income tax payee or death cases were excluded. About 1.5 lakh persons voluntarily excluded themselves from the list.”

“We have done a validation across a number of data bases. We have with us complete information of the people figured in this list of 12.45 lakh. We don’t think this list includes the name of any influential person as a beneficiary. If by chance any error detected, we have also a system for rectification,” the secretary assured.