Hyderabad: Even two years after taking the oath as Members of Parliament (Lok Sabha), some lawmakers have failed to utilise funds allotted to them under the Member of Parliament Local Area Development Scheme (MPLADS). Ironically, six MPs utilised less than 10% of their allocated funds. The Centre allocates Rs 5 crore every year to each lawmaker under MPLADS.While the national average for utilisation of funds is 75%, Telangana ranks 24th among 28 states in the country, and the average utilisation is 23%.According to data uploaded by ‘Empowered Indian’ website, an independent public-interest data dashboard, designed to make public Indian govt data more accessible for citizens and others, the Centre had allocated Rs 394 crore to the 23 MPs (17 Lok Sabha and six Rajya Sabha MPs), but only Rs 94 crore was utilised and 2,347 works were completed.Of the 23 MPs, Nizamabad MP Dharmapuri Arvind is at the top in utilisation of MPLAD funds with 56% spending of Rs 28 crore allotted in the past two years. Similarly, Mahabubabad MP Balaram Naik spent 49% of the funds, while BRS Rajya Sabha MP Vaddiraju Ravichandra had spent 48% of funds.Malkajgiri MP Eatala Rajender, who secured the highest fund allocation of Rs 32 crore, utilised just Rs 3.47 crore, about 11% of the allocation. Of the 23 MPs, six MPs (three each from LS and RS, respectively), spent less than 10% of their funds in two years. Interestingly, Abhishekh Manu Singhvi, whose term started a few months ago, has zero expenditure.Of the two Union ministers, G Kishan Reddy had spent Rs 47.50 lakh of Rs 14.70 crore allotted, which was about 3.23% of the funds, while Bandi Sanjay Kumar spent Rs 6.50 crore of Rs 17.27 crore, which was about 38% of the funds, according to the portal.But Kishan Reddy’s office said that the Union minister recommended Rs 10 crore worth of works out of the Rs 14 crore till March 2026 and Rs 8.90 crore has already been completed. “Generally, the district administration (Hyderabad) has to get the works done by the executing agency and get completion certification and provide a utilisation certificate to the Centre. Probably, the collectorate has not updated the details on the portal,” a representative from Kishan Reddy’s office said, denying such low utilisation.Bandi Sanjay Kumar’s office said details of works were probably not uploaded by the chief planning officers of the respective districts and were not reflecting on the website. They said since 2019, the minister had recommended works worth Rs 30 crore and Sanjay was left with only Rs 88 lakh in balance till the end of the last financial year.Interestingly, AIMIM MP Asaduddin Owaisi’s fund utilisation was just 7.6%, with spending of Rs 1.11 crore of Rs 14.70 crore allocated, while Congress MPs Renuka Chowdary and BRS MP B Partha Saradhi Reddy spent only 2.08% and 2.43% of the MPLADS funds, respectively.The MPs claim that though they had given recommendation letters for various works, district collectors were not giving approvals and administrative sanction for the works immediately. Executing agencies such as GHMC, rural irrigation corporations and other agencies were not completing the works and some works were pending for over five years.
