Odisha model state in DMF

Bhubaneswar: Odisha has become a model state in the country so far as using of District Mineral Foundation (DMF) funds.

“Odisha’s performance in implementation of Pradhan Mantri Khanij Kshetra Kalayan Yojana (District Mineral Foundation-DMF)  is found best among all states”,  said union cabinet secretary Pradeep Kumar Sinha.

 

The cabinet secretary, who reviewed the progress of the programme in different states over a video conferencing on Wednesday, said, “Odisha has taken up the right projects as per norms and objectives of the programme”.

The Odisha chief secretary  Aditya Prasad Padhi, development commissioner  R.Balakrishnan and principal secretary steel & mines Raj Kumar Sharma represented Odisha in the video conferencing.

Odisha has developed and applied an IT based monitoring system in shape of a web-portal for sanction and monitoring of the projects under DMF. The chief secretary appraised that Odisha had applied a good and successful IT monitoring system for mine and minerals. The learning and experiences from that was further developed and applied in designing of the web-portal for DMF.  Further,  Padhi added that very shortly this portal would also be made transaction based.  It was known from the review that government of India would put in place a central web-portal for monitoring progress of the scheme. It was said by a senior officer from the union ministry  that Odisha’s portal would be taken as a model portal in development of the central portal.

Appraising about implementation of the scheme, the chief secretary  said that DMF has been constituted in all 30 districts of the state. A total amount of around Rs 3,737 crore has been collected  till 3oth November, 2017 out of which around Rs1,369 crore came from coal  and lignite, Rs 2,351 crore came from major mineral other than coal and Rs17 cr came from minor minerals. The projects were sanctioned under two broad heads,  “ High Priority” and “ Other Priority” projects. The high priority areas included the projects like housing, drinking water, health, sanitation, roads,  welfare of  women & children and  skill development . The projects of worth Rs1,200 crore  have been sanctioned in these areas. Besides,  projects of worth Rs707 crore has been sanctioned for other priority areas like connectivity,  public facility energy, irrigation afforestation etc. In total around Rs 1,907 crore has been allotted to different districts against 5886 sanctioned projects. Development commissioner Balakrishnan said the sanctioned projects would touch Rs6,000 crore by end of January, 2018.

The funds are being spent on healthcare, education, transport and communication, sanitation, child and women welfare programmes in the areas affected by mining in different parts of state.

Additional secretary planning & convergence Debendra Kumar Jena coordinated the video conferencing.