Patna, April 14: After huge uproar over alleged large-scale irregularity in the family survey conducted by Patna Municipal Corporation (PMC) last year, the civic agency is all set to table a fresh study report on Monday in its standing committee meeting after a gap of 15 months. Mayor Afzal Imam claimed that the chances of error in the report prepared were minimal.

“The work was assigned to a private agency. They have prepared the report. It will be presented before the standing committee in the meeting,” said Imam. He also said the results of the survey would be the basis of several PMC projects and schemes. The below poverty line families enlisted in the survey would be able to avail various central government schemes, he said.

Imam said: “Taking lessons from the last year’s mistakes, the councillors were asked to supervise the survey process. After presenting the report in the committee meeting, it would be sent to the state government for approval.”

The survey carried out last year had raised the number of below poverty line families from 65 to 90 lakh. But the families in various wards of the state capital alleged that the central government benefits did not reach them. The residents alleged that at least 85 per cent BPL families had been ignored.

Organisations like Jhuggi Jhopri Sangharsh Morcha said over 50 per cent people live below poverty line in 65 slum areas and other localities.

Of them, 70 per cent be- long to Mahadalit and extremely backward castes and 93 per cent work in unorganised sector without any job guarantee.

The morcha alleged that the survey committed grave irregularities and 85 per cent of the poorest people in Patna’s urban areas were not receiving anything from the public distribution shops because of wrong entries.

“Owing to these discrepancies, the beneficiaries were denied coupons for foodgrain and kerosene. What surprised people most was that no ward councillor was involved in the exercise of family survey and the preparation of list and ration cards,” Bheekhu Paswan, a slum dweller near Bakargunj locality of the city told The Telegraph.

“The government, despite being aware of the mistakes, failed to act and the urban development department allowed the implementation of the schemes on the basis of the wrong survey report,” he said.

The morcha had petitioned the PMC commissioner, apprehending that the ration cards, supposed to be distributed among the below poverty line families, would be full of mistakes. Their apprehension was correct.

Authorities in the PMC and the district administration officially admitted to have received more than one lakh complaints of wrong entries and exclusion.

They also conceded that severe discrepancies had been found in the process.

“All these discrepancies have been done away with in this report,” said a PMC official.

The family survey is not the sole example where PMC faltered. Finding several faults in the draft Master Plan 2021 for Patna five years after it was floated, the state urban development department recently forwarded it to Centre for Environmental Planning and Technology University (CEPT) in Ahmedabad for rectifications.

PMC had floated the plan in 2006.

D.K. Shukla, the special secretary of the urban development department, had said the proposed master plan had several defects.

“All modern and scientific master plans are based on cadastral surveys and satellite imaging. The floated master plan did not fulfil those specifications. We have now sent the city development plan to CEPT, which has prepared master plans for several cities, including Hyderabad. The plan prepared by them will be modern, error-free and with area calculations based on longitude-altitude measures,” he had told The Telegraph.

Shukla said the draft was expected to be prepared within the next three months. The cabinet will approve it thereafter. “The implementation of the proposals will start then,” Shukla said.

The present mayor was a councillor when the draft was approved by the PMC board. “Many proposals and schemes are stuck as the master plan is still waiting government’s nod,” the mayor said.

As per the master plan approved by the board, the present Patna urban area consisting of Patna municipal area, Danapur Nizamat, Danapur cantonment and their outgrowth is 135sqkm. It is projected to reach 333.2sqkm by 2021.