‘Forgotten: School board’s 19 schemes’

Ratna Vora, Congress corporator from Rakhial ward in Ahmedabad Municipal Corporation (AMC), on Tuesday took on the municipal school board for not implementing ambitious schemes after allocating money.

Vora was speaking during the AMC’s budget session organised to discuss financial allocation and invite suggestions. “Of the 27 schemes announced, the municipal school board has not spent even a single penny for 19 schemes during the financial year 2008-09,” she said.

Another Congress councillor, Taufiq Pathan, said that if the ruling party could not spend the money allotted in the budget, there was no need to pass budget of a huge amount for the next fiscal. “We should propose and allocate money for the work that could be completed,” he said.

He also demanded that the state government increase the grant given to VS Hospital to Rs5 crore from Rs2 crore, taking into account the inflation and expenditure of the hospital.

Standing committee chairman Asit Vora presented the budgets of municipal school board, VS Hospital, AMTS and MJ Library for the year 2009-10. Vora presented the budget of Rs286.81 crore for municipal school board, while the budget for MJ Library was Rs4.55 crore. The budget for AMTS was estimated at Rs256.93 crore, while that of VS Hospital was estimated at Rs74.22 crore.