PMAY: Centre team visits Sevoke, KalijhoraPMAY: Centre team visits Sevoke, Kalijhora

SNS, SILIGURI, 15 JANUARY, 2023 : Two representatives from the Awadh Research Foundation, Lucknow AK Sharma and A Joshi who arrived here yesterday to inquire into alleged irregularities in the Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana- Gram in (PM AY-G)) scheme, visited Sevoke and Kalijhora areas in Darjeeling district "like tourists" today, an official holiday and a Sunday, as people were in a festive mood for the Makar Sankranti festival here. 

Though Deputy Secretary of the Government India SK Mishra, in a letter to the Secretary P Jaganathan, has asked that "concerned officials may also be directed to facilitate and co-operate with National-Level Monitors (NLM) in carrying out their enquiry during holidays also, if required, during the visit, the two officials have not yet minified the alleged deprived beneficiaries in Darjeeling as well as Kalimpong districts, from where Union Ministry of Rural Development received complaints of irregularities," sources said. 

"Though they interacted with district officials, including Darjeeling District Magistrate S Ponnambalam, last evening, the NLM officials did not have the required papers to examine beneficiaries and deprived beneficiaries under the PMAY (G) today," a source said. 

Sources also said that the team members would talk to officials of the Union Ministry of Rural Development and do the needful tomorrow. Ministrative sources said that during the survey for PMAY in the district during 2018-19, the proposed list was prepared for 30,000 people, but during the three-step verification in November- December last year to ensure that no non-eligible person gets the PMAY benefit, 6000 names were deleted. Of the 24,000, the list for 7,700 was prepared as eligible persons for the 2022-23 financial year. 

Officials said the ministry had decided to depute five teams of NLMs to conduct a detailed inquiry into complaints related to the PMAY- G in Darjeeling, Kalimpong, Malda, Murshidabad, East Midnapore, West Midnapore, South 24 Parganas, Nadia, Alipurduar and East Burdwan.