By Our Correspondent
BHUBANESWAR: With the Naveen Patnaik led BJD Government in Odisha has stepped up its efforts to contain the outbreak of COVID-19 as Positive cases reached at 82 by Wednesday afternoon following by funds crunch to meet the situation, the Patnaik administration, after utilising some shares of District Mineral Foundation Funds(DMF Funds of Rs 9000 crore), is now reportedly eyeing on Rs 17,000 crore deposited at RBI account of Odisha Mineral Bearing Areas Development Corporation (OMBADC) and the Compensatory Afforestation (CAMPA).
The State Government is likely to withdraw around Rs 12,000 crore from these two accounts at RBI. Sources said, Justice (Retired) AK Patnaik, who heads the oversight committee supervising OMBADC’s expenditures, will take a final call on it.
The Rs 17,000 crore fund was born when the Supreme Court on August 2, 2017 levied a compensation charge on miners for violations of environmental laws. The state was directed to spend the funds in districts affected by mining activities. Much of this money lies unspent, as does the huge amount iron ore-rich districts such as Keonjhar earn as tax levied towards district mineral funds.
Earlier, the Centre had allowed states to tap into 30% of unutilised district mineral funds for use in the fight against Covid-19. Odisha may, if required, later also push its cash-rich PSUs to increase expenditure, to help boost economic activity.
