PANAJI: Village panchayats of Bardez and Salcete contribute a third, Rs 9 crore of the total Rs 24.24 crore unutilized funds released to Goa under the Fourteenth Finance Commission since 2015.
As per the data available with the Directorate of Panchayats, two instalments of Rs 7.22 crore each were released to the 190 village panchayats in the financial year 2015-16, while an amount of Rs 10 crore was distributed equally among the panchayats in 2016-17.
Out of Rs 10 crore, a total amount of Rs 23 lakh was utilized by all the village panchayats with Pernem topping the list.
The accumulated unutilized balance amount pending with panchayats in Goa stands at a whopping Rs 24.24 crore. Panchayats from Bardez have a total of Rs five crore unutilized funds while those from Salcete have Rs four crore unutilized, which was sanctioned under the Fourteenth Finance Commission.
Director of Panchayats Sandhya Kamat informed that the focus of the grants released this year will be on maintenance of the sanitation facilities created under the plan in the previous year.
In addition to these funds, 10 per cent of the grants under Fourteenth Finance Commission was released as performance grants for works which include auditing and maintenance of accounting systems at the panchayat office.