500 children homes under lens

Most of the 500 children homes allotted by the state government in 2008 were bogus and their allotment erroneous, finance minister Ajit Pawar revealed in the state cabinet on Wednesday.

A  review and subsequent action on an urgent basis has been ordered.

Pawar made the revelation after women and child wefare minister Varsha Gaikwad questioned why the government was delaying releasing its hiked share of aid for students living in children homes run by private institutions.

She was referring to the cabinet approval to hike the government’s contribution to Rs900 from the earlier Rs635, for every student living in homes run by the private institutions, in October 2011.

However, Pawar said a thorough inquiry needed to be conducted to check the validity of the children homes, especially the 500-odd which were allotted in 2008.

Stating that the finance department had rejected the proposal to hike the government share of the monthly aid given to the institutions, Pawar threw more light on the irregularities committed while allowing new children homes in the state. His department discovered that most of the 500 children homes allotted in 2008 were bogus and their allotment erroneous. There are 1,100 children homes in the state which accommodate about 90,000 children, including the mentally retarded, destitute and those rescued from begging rackets.

It was also found  that the allotment of 500 children homes was done in 2008 alone, and that too in one particular region, by the then chief minister Vilasrao Deshmukh.

That most of them should be allotted to a single region violated the norm of ‘minimum distance between two homes’ as well as the eligibility of the institutions running them, thus leading to regional imbalance in availability of children homes.

The department also has discovered that the norm and conditions were not followed while giving approval to them. The enrolment of the student, their number shown in the registers and funds claims by the government were all matters of doubt, said Pawar.

When Gaikwad proposed that the hiked government contributions should not be stalled, as licences of 71 homes had already been suspended and an inquiry being conducted, Pawar clarified that his department had rejected the proposal due to the anomalies.