CAG smells a rat in Covid relief disbursal to workers

BHUBANESWAR: When the Covid-19 pandemic brought life and livelihood to a complete halt, the urban local bodies (ULBs) and block offices of Odisha ‘disbursed’ a whopping Rs 68.24 crore to 4.55 lakh building and other construction (BOC) workers but furnished acknowledgements of only 67,000 beneficiaries (15 per cent) in support of receipt of an amount of Rs 10.12 crore.

This startling revelation has been made in the latest CAG report which said The Labour and Employees’ State Insurance (L&ESI) department decided in March 2020 to grant special financial assistance (SFA) at the rate of Rs 1,500 per registered BOC worker in the first wave of the pandemic.