Fund shortage leaves Ashrayan Project-2 at risk

Rezaul Karim | Published: April 03, 2015 00:00:00 | Updated: November 30, 2024 06:01:00

Implementation of the government's ongoing Ashrayan Project-(2) is on the verge of getting severely impeded due to non-availability of required fund.
Implementation of the Ashrayan Project-(2) would be hindered if the authority concerned did not provide an additional allocation of Tk 500 million in the revised budget of the current fiscal year (FY) urgently, sources said.
The cost was projected at about Tk 4.32 billion, according to the approved Development Project Proforma (DPP) of the Ashrayan Project-(2) in the FY 2014-15. The project authority had sought an allocation of Tk 2.0 billion out of Tk 4.32 billion at a meeting of the budget committee. But only Tk 1.5 billion was allocated for the project, they added.
"Tk 1.10 billion out of the allocation of Tk 1.50 billion was spent until March, 2015. It is not possible to run the project due to insufficient allocation," an official at the Prime Minister's Office (PMO) told the FE. Â
He, however, said implementation of the project would miss the completion deadline if the additional allocation was not provided for the project.
The project office of the Ashrayan Project-(2) under the PMO sought an additional allocation of Tk 500 million from the ministry of finance (MoF) recently, a high official of the MoF said.
The government, in 1997, took up the project titled Ashrayan aiming to rehabilitate landless, homeless, jobless people and victims of river erosion on khas lands at different places across the country.
The government settled over 47,210 such families in the period of 1997-2002 through the Ashrayan project at a cost of Tk 3.0 billion, the PMO data showed.
At the second stage, over 58,703 families were settled during the period of 2002-2010 by the Ashrayan (phase-2) at a cost of Tk 6.08 billion.Â Â
About 50,000 families are supposed to be settled during the period of 2010-2017 under the Ashrayan-(2) project at a cost of Tk 22.04 billion.
According to PMO officials, about 55 multi-storied buildings will be built at different places all over the country under the Ashrayan-2 project. Two of the total (55) multi-storied buildings are awaiting inauguration.Â Â
"The Ashrayan-2 project is working for alleviating poverty of the landless and homeless families of the country by focusing on human resource development," a deputy project director of Ashrayan-2 told the FE.
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