HANM opposed to changing of India to Bharat
Staff Reporter
Shillong, Sept 15: The Hynniewtrep National Achik Movement (HANM) today informed that it will write to all three Member of Parliament (MP) of the state to oppose the move of the central government under the leadership of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) to change the name of India to Bharat.
Speaking to media persons, HNAM president Lamphrang Kharbani alleged that the motive of the central government to change the name of India to Bharat is to impose one religion in the country which is against the constitution of the country.
Kharbani said that such an idea to change the name to Bharat also indicates that the BJP-led government disregard the people who are not familiar with the party ideologies like language, religion, practice and customs.
He added that the intention of the BJP government to rename India to Bharat is unacceptable and the HANM and the people of Meghalaya strongly oppose this since India is a diverse nation formed by nearly 500 kingdoms including the Khasi States.
“The HANM strongly opposed the renaming of India to Bharat and we also urged our MPs to oppose this in the parliament” said Kahrbani.
Kharbani said that if the BJP-led government decides to go ahead with renaming India to Bharat, then it will clearly show that the party does not respect the kingdom that was formed to make India and this might lead to mass protests all over the country including in Meghalaya.
ADCs fail to submit UCs on central schemes
The autonomous district councils (ADCs) have failed to submit pending utilization certificates (UCs) for the implementation of various development schemes sanctioned by the Centre during 2017 – 2022.
Out of the grants of Rs 385.71 crore received as central grants during 2017-22, the ADCs could submit UCs for only Rs 129.63 crore (34%) of the total fund allotted, said the State Finances Audit Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General of India for the year ended March 31, 2022.
Non-submission of the UCs means that the authorities have not explained as to how funds were spent over the years or they were not spent, it said.
The CAG has suggested that the ADCs may be advised to submit the pending UCs.
Meanwhile, the report said that the annual accounts of the ADCs were in arrears for two to six years.
The outstanding annual accounts of the KHADC were from 2020-21 to 2021-22, JHADC from 2019-20 to 2021-22 and GHADC from 2016-17 to 2021-22.
As per the Fund Rules of JHADC and GHADC, the annual accounts were to be submitted to the PAG (Audit) by June 30 of each year but no prescribed date was mentioned in the Fund Rules of the KHADC.
The CAG said that persistent delay in the finalization of accounts is fraught with the risk of fraud and leakage of public money going undetected. It recommended that the state government may advise the ADCs to finalise the arrear accounts and submit them to the Principal Accountant General (Audit).