Opposition parties in Bihar see a design in the state government’s latest move to allow legislators to recommend replacement of damaged transformers using the chief minister area development scheme (CMADS) fund.
A proposal in this regard has been sent to the CM’s secretariat and may be approved within a week.
Opposition members feel that approving the proposed changes in CMADS norms would put the onus of fulfilling CM Nitish Kumar’s promise to the people on the legislators. “The CM had announced that he would not seek votes again if he fails to deliver power to every household by 2015. He should try to achieve the goal through government machinery,” Leader of Opposition in the Assembly Abdul Bari Siddiqui said.
“By giving legislators the power to recommend change of transformers using CMADS fund, he appears to be putting additional pressure on them as people would come to them if they face problems,” Siddiqui said.
Congress legislative party leader and Kahalgaon MLA Sadanand Singh echoed Siddiqui. “Instead of putting additional burden on legislators, the CM should ensure that the agencies responsible for delivering electricity to the people are put to task,” he said.
But energy minister Bijendra Yadav said, “The change has not been notified yet. If it happens, a majority of MLAs would be happy as they would be able to meet people’s demands on this front. Legislators not willing to use CMADS for this purpose would always have the liberty to recommend works of their choice.”
CMADS was introduced in 2011 after the CM scrapped the legislators’ area development scheme in 2010 under which they could get works of their choice — costing up to Rs 1 crore every year — done by agencies of their choice.