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Can't
blame courts if they try to help poor: Apex court
The Supreme Court has slammed the
political executive both at the central and the state level for
tardy implementation of welfare schemes and raising the bogey of
judicial activism when courts intervene and issues directions
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New Delhi:
Highlighting the large inefficacy of various government schemes,
including flagship programmes, because of corruption at different
levels, India's apex human rights body Friday said it is reviewing
the programmes' impact and will submit a report to the UN.
Naming some of the government's flagship programmes like the
Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MNREGS)
and the Integrated Child Development Services (ICDS) as being not
very effective because of corruption, a National Human Rights
Commission (NHRC) member said that because of this "change has not
yet come to rural India".
According to panel member Satyabrata Pal, the UN asks for reports
from its member countries every four years on the state of human
rights. India submitted its report for the first time in 2008 and
listed the NREGA and ICDS programmes as means to improve the
quality of life of its people.
"Besides the respective countries, the UN also requires the civil
society and a national human rights body to submit their report.
So for 2012 we are going to review the impact of the government
schemes and it's going to be a stinging report," Pal said.
"Since in 2012, the 12th Five Year Plan will also go into
operation, it will be a good wrap-up of the 11th Plan. As per our
assessment, a lot of money has gone down the drain with targets
not achieved," he added.
For instance, Pal said, the women and child development ministry
had a target to raise the sex ratio from 927 in 2001 to 935 in
2011, and then 950 by 2016.
"But as of now, the sex ratio is 914...which means that it has
become just worse," he said.
"One of our special rapporteurs had gone to a district in Uttar
Pradesh to review the ICDS scheme and came back with the report
that 61 percent funds have been siphoned off. It's shocking," Pal
added.
Similarly, people are getting 46 days of employment, on an
average, as part of the MNREGA, instead of the guaranteed 100 days
of employment in a year, he said.
"But our report will also point the government's shortcomings
which it has admitted to by itself," Pal said.
As part of their audit, NHRC has been holding regional meetings to
interact with civil society to ask about their opinion on the
implementation of various government schemes.
"We should work together to make the government accountable at all
levels," Pal added.
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