Member of Parliament Local Area Development (MPLAD) scheme
Member of Parliament Local Area Development (MPLAD) scheme, introduced in December 1993 is an important scheme of Government of India which empowers every Member of Parliament (MP) to spend a certain sum of amount on the development of his/her constituency on various social development areas such as health, education, drinking water, electricity, family welfare, sanitations and so on.
The central idea is creation of durable community assets and for provision of basic facilities including community infrastructure, based on local requirements.
The scheme essentially entitles every MP (Lok Sabha as well as Rajya Sabha Members) to recommend spending Rs. 5 crore every year on works of development nature.
The MPs can recommend the work(s) in their constituency (in case of Lok Sabha) or anywhere in the state from where they are elected (in case of Rajya Sabha).
The ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation has been designated as the nodal agency to coordinate the work and to conduct Internet audit of the work carried out by the public representatives. The ministry compiles the data of the utilization of the fund based upon the inputs provided by the concerned.
Type of Scheme
MPLADS is a centrally-sponsored plan scheme fully funded by the government of India. Under this scheme, the funds are released in the form of grants in-aid directly to the district authorities.
Eligible Expenditures
The expenditures eligible under this programme are essentially those developmental works which are based on local needs and assets, thus created are always available for the use of the public at large.
The preference is given to works such as related to national priorities, including provision of drinking water, public health, education, sanitation, roads, etc.
Non-lapsable Fund
The funds released under the scheme are non-lapsable. This means that if the funds for a particular is not spent in that year, it will be
carried forward to the subsequent years, subject to eligibility.
Role of MPs
The annual entitlement per MP/constituency at present is Rs 5 crore. Role of MPs is only recommendatory. They can recommend their choice of works to the concerned district authorities who implement these works by following the established procedures of the concerned state government.
Role of District Authority
The district authority is empowered to examine the eligibility of works sanction funds and select the implementing agencies, prioritise works, supervise overall execution, and monitor the scheme at the ground level.
The district authorities get the works executed through the line departments, local self governments or other government agencies. In some cases, the district authorities get the works executed through reputed non government organisations.
How does it work?
In the MPLAD scheme, MPs can only recommend the work. The actual implementation is entirely in the hands of district authorities supervised by the district collector. Each MP can recommend to district collector the development works not exceeding Rs. 25 lakhs for each work. Detailed guidelines have been issued by the ministry for its effective implementation and submit the physical and financial status of the work periodically.
The scheme was thought to be a potential developmental scheme which would benefits the local residents of every constituency/district in the form of suitable social infrastructure. It was suppose to enthuse more energy into the representatives to recommend productive works in their areas in order to receive favourable votes in the next polls.
Problems with the Scheme
However, the scheme largely failed to achieve its objective and met the fate of other similar schemes which benefitted only to certain strata precisely the Politian-bureaucrats-contractors. The scheme though has many credible works in its credit (such as Bihar Flood rehabilitation, Tsunami Works, etc), majority of the fund allocated for the scheme was either unspent or spent frivolously which only bewildered the hopes of the common man and made the nexus even more powerful.
The total amount spent using MPLAD scheme is not less than Rs. 4000 crore per annum at the rate of Rs. 5 crore on one MP. The ministry of statistics and programme implementation, the nodal agency in its internal audit has consistently exposed that majority of the MPs in the key competency of spending the amount properly and on effective and duration assets have failed in their duty. The sorry state of affairs even continued in the last lok Sabha (i.e. the 15th lok Sabha) in which not even a single Member of Parliament has been able to utilize the fund allocated under the scheme for infrastructure development in his/her constituency.
Also, recent reply under Right to Information Act, 2005 showed that in majority of the districts, the guidelines for implementing the scheme were violated and some MPs even went to the extent of creating their own assets out of this fund contravening the strict guidelines on what areas the money can be spent.
The implementation of the scheme was entitled to the district authorities only to make it more efficient and without any undue involvement from the concerned MP. It was also entrusted that a transparent and accountable system will be developed by the giving the implementation to seasoned officer (such as engineers, accountants, etc) under the direct control and supervision of the District collector. The MP was allowed to only inspect the work created so far. However, it could not prevent the nexus to develop and use it to fulfil their objectives rather than the objectives which were envisioned at its conception.
MPLAD and Principle of separation of power
One of the important issues is that MPLAD Scheme assigns executive functions to legislators and thereby confuses the separation of power. The Second Administrative reform Commission used this critique to recommend that the Scheme be abolished. As local bodies are better placed to deliver civic services then it may be wiser to devolve funds directly to them rather than to the MPs.
Improvisation
MPLAD scheme can be improved with certain tweaks in its implementation reforms. The districts authorities and MPs should be answerable to the effective utilization of the fund and there should an incentive for those officials who are doing the work as per the expectations to achieve the common objective of local development via creating durable social assets. The continuous monitoring recommendation of Controller and Auditor General (CAG) of India should also be followed.
The MPLAD scheme has great potential to develop each constituency and district provided it has been studded with proper implementation mechanism which should essentially break this nexus of politician-bureaucrat-contractor.
