The state government has shed one more load off district magistrates (DMs) and divisional commissioners. They have been divested of powers to grant administrative sanction for projects under Mukhya Mantri Gram Sadak Yojana.

As part of the scheme, a village with a population between 500 and 999 is connected with a metalled road. A district-level organising committee, headed by ministers including those in-charge of the districts, will select villages to be connected with metalled roads under the Mukhya Mantri Gram Sadak Yojana.

According to a letter issued by the rural works department last week, the administrative sanction will now be granted by the superintending engineers, the department secretary and the minister concerned, while the engineers of the department will give the technical approval.

Earlier, executive engineers of the department granted technical sanction for projects up to Rs 50 lakh, whereas DMs gave the administrative approval. Similarly, superintending engineers gave technical approval for projects between Rs 50 lakh and Rs 10 crore and divisional commissioners gave the administrative sanction.

According to a fresh directive issued by rural works department secretary B. Rajendra, assistant engineers will give technical approval for projects worth Rs 1 lakh, executive engineers for projects worth Rs 3.5 lakh, superintending engineers for projects worth Rs 70 lakh and chief engineers for projects above that.

The department secretary will give administrative sanction for projects worth Rs 2.5 crore and the minister of the department for projects worth Rs 10 crore. However, sanction for projects worth Rs 20 crore has to come from the minister of the department as well as the finance minister.

The state cabinet will sanction projects above Rs 20 crore. “The move is aimed at speeding up the process for timely execution of projects undertaken in the districts covered by the Mukhya Mantri Gram Sadak Yojana. Earlier, there were many complaints of files getting stuck at the DM- and divisional commissioner-level,” a senior IAS officer told The Telegraph.

Sources said about 4,194 km metalled roads in rural areas had been constructed under the Mukhya Mantri Gram Sadak Yojana since 2006 (till March 2012) at Rs 1,921.78 crore. A sum of Rs 600 crore has been earmarked for construction of about 1,250km road under the scheme in 2012-13.

The government has appointed ministers in-charge for each district for timely execution of development works in the state. District-level organising committees work under the ministers in-charge of the district concerned. Local MLAs and MLCs are also associated with district organising committees. The ministers in-charge visit the districts from time to time to review development projects. The new directive with regard to depriving the DMs and the divisional commissioners of their powers to grant administrative sanction for the projects under the Mukhya Mantri Gram Sadak Yojana is being viewed as another blow to senior bureaucrats assigned field duty.

Earlier, the DMs’ role was redefined and they were divested of powers to sign cheques of development and welfare schemes. Redefinition of the DMs’ role was a fall-out of Chief Minister’s Local Area Development Scheme, which replaced the MLA local area fund. This was the first scheme to be controlled by an engineer-in-chief at the secretariat.