Cong uses RTI to show that Punjab doesn’t use Central funds well enough.

Indian Express; Saturday, Jun 25, 2011,

Mohali : Setting out to prove allegations that the SAD-BJP combine government has failed to optimally utilise funds released by the Congress-led UPA government at the Centre, senior leaders of the Punjab Pradesh Congress Committee and the Punjab Youth Congress on Friday filed applications under the Right to Information (RTI) Act to seek information on the way the state has been using Central funds.

Congress MP from Anandpur Sahib and PYC president Ravneet Singh Bittu walked down to the office of Deputy Commissioner in Mohali to file an RTI application seeking details of the Central funds provided, allocated, received, spent, remaining unutilised, refunded and diverted under various public welfare and development projects and schemes in the district since January 1, 2007, till date.

“We have resorted to the RTI tool on the directions of Congress general secretary Rahul Gandhi to expose the poor performance of the present regime in Punjab,” Bittu said after submitting the RTI plea to Deputy Commissioner Varun Roojam.

He said the idea behind extracting the information under the RTI was to make the public aware of the alleged failure of the state government to properly utilise the funds released by the Union government. “To hide its own failure, Punjab keeps accusing the Centre of neglecting the state and meting step-motherly treatment to it but the fact is that the Centre is treating Punjab at par with other states but Punjab has failed to make optimum utilisation of Central grants, most of which go unutilised and hence lapse,” alleged Bittu.

The young parliamentarian sounded confident that the compilation of replies to the RTI applications will make people judge, decide and compare the performance of governments at the Centre and Punjab.

Similar RTI applications were filed by Gurkirat Singh in Ludhiana, Kamaljit Singh Brar in Moga, Raman Bakshi in Amritsar, Vikram Joshi in Gurdaspur, Navreet Singh Jallewal in Tarn Taran, Sandeep Jakhar in Ferozepur, Dhanjit Singh Dhani in Faridkot, Narinder Singh Kaoni in Muktsar, Bikram Singh Mofar in Mansa, Sandeep Singla in Sangrur, Rajesh Attri in Patiala and Sandeep Verma in Fatehgarh Sahib.