By Mumtaz Alam Falahi, TwoCircles.net,
New Delhi: Muslims in India have lagged in social, educational and economic development compared to other communities not only because of paucity of schemes but also lack of awareness about and their participation in such schemes. The latest example is the central government’s Multi-sectoral Development Plans (MsDP) for 90 Minority Concentration Districts (MCDs).
It is a fact that schemes, state or central, meant for minorities often get half-hearted attention of officials at all levels, and so there is always a need for the intended beneficiaries, the minority community in this case, to be aware of the
schemes and ensure their participation,” Arshad Ajmal, director of Patna-based Al-Khair Charitable Trust, told TwoCircles.net. Ajmal and his team has been active in the last six months to ensure that government surveys in seven MCDs in Bihar are done properly covering major problems and requirements of the community.
But he is not satisfied with the baseline survey conducted in MCDs in Bihar to find out actual situation of education, sanitation, housing, drinking water supply, electricity supply and livelihood activities there. Ajmal gives the example
of Kishanganj.
According to a special team of the Planning Commission (2005), he said, the iron content in the water in the district is reported as high as 3-20 mg/l as against the
permissible limit of 0.3mg/l”. However, the baseline survey for the MsDP done in Kishanganj doesn’t identify high levels of iron in the water as one of the problems that needs to be addressed. If local residents and representatives had been involved in planning and doing the survey, this problem would have surfaced in the report, Ajmal argued.
The regional research institutes affiliated with the Indian Council of Social Science Research (ICSSR), New Delhi have been assigned the work of baseline survey. The Delhi-based Institute for Human Development has done that survey in Bihar.
Seven districts of Bihar have been identified as MCD. The central government has tentatively allocated the amount. The details are as follows:
Financial assistance for MCDs in Bihar
| Sl. No. | Name of District | Tentative allocation of fund (Rs. In crore) |
| 1 | Araria | 81.1 |
| 2 | Kishanganj | 87.9 |
| 3 | Purnia | 85.5 |
| 4 | Katihar | 82.6 |
| 5 | Sitamarhi | 67.8 |
| 6 | Pashchim Champaran | 58.6 |
| 7 | Darbhanga | 59.7 |
| Total | 523.2 |
Some time back Ajmal’s Al-Khair Charitable Trust, in collaboration with Lok Parishad, Bihar Rabita Committee, had organized a state-level consultation programme in Patna to discuss the issues related to MsDP and make NGOs and activists aware of the scheme.
Ajmal said peoples’ participation and involvement of PRIs, NGOs and Self Help Groups should be ensured at every stage including plan formulation, implementation and monitoring as this has been mentioned in the guidelines of the MsDP scheme. Very soon he will hold a meeting to take stock of the actual progress on the MsDP scheme, he told TCN.