Fund crunch hits KAAC

GUWAHATI, March 8: Employees working in different departments under Karbi Anglong Autonomous Council (KAAC) have not received their salary for at least four months as the Council is in financial straitjacket which has already exhausted the Budget provision for the current financial. However, even as the employees are left to reel under hardship, bills of contractors are being paid without delay. This has raised many a eyebrows for the simple reason that any administration authority dogged by fund crisis would have opted to pay its employees first before settling bills of contractors who could have been made to wait for a couple of months. Teachers in Diphu Government college have not received monthly salary for the last two months while teachers in different schools are yet to receive salary for several months. It was learnt that a large number of teachers working in the hill districts are forced by the circumstances to borrow money from private money lenders in order to sustain their family. Although the state government had provided the KAAC with the entire Budget amount for the year 2000-2001, the Council has run out of money to pay salaries to the employees as it resorted to huge amount of unbudgeted expenditure. Despite the severe financial crisis, how can the Council authority still pay the contractors? Sources informed that the fund to pay contractors was probably being sourced at revenue deposit. Even security deposits made by contractors are being utilised to pay the bills in gross violation of norms. Meanwhile, the state government is not going to provide the Council with much needed fund till March 31 next. The fund will start flowing only in the next financial year beginning on April 1, 2001. However, the Council authority which is languishing under a huge deficit, is not likely to be able to tide over the crisis only with the regular Budget allocation in the next financial year.