CAG: Rs 1,261-cr not accounted for in KCR Kits

Hyderabad: Records of year-wise payments towards the BRS government’s pet initiative ‘KCR Kit Scheme’ to the tune of Rs 1,261.67 crore are not available for audit purposes. This was exposed by the Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) report on public health infrastructure and management of health services for the year ended March 2022. The report was tabled in the Legislative Assembly on Friday. It nails the BRS government for not providing details after it claimed that 13,90,636 individuals had benefitted under the direct benefit scheme.

The government had claimed that all measures were taken to clear the dues from time to time for the KCR Kits scheme. But, the CAG failed to get the year-wise details.

The scheme was implemented to improve instances of institutional deliveries and to improve infant mortality rate (IMR) and maternal mortality rate (MMR). The government was to pay Rs 12,000 for boys and Rs 13,000 for girls born during deliveries at government healthcare facilities.

The CAG report pointed out that a significant number of registered beneficiaries of 9,357 at the ANC stage, 8,425 at the delivery stage, 21,079 at the first immunisation stage and 80,804 cases at the second immunisation stage had not received payment for over three years (up to 2019-20).

The health department had stated in December 2022 that payments would be released to the beneficiaries based on the availability of funds. However, the government had claimed that Rs 1,261.67 crore had been transferred to over 13.90 lakh beneficiaries.

The government had told CAG that the KCR Kits data indicated 99.9 per cent of institutional deliveries in 2022-23 and that as per National Family Health Scheme- V, Telangana stood fourth in the country in institutional deliveries. It was also stated that the state was focusing on ensuring 100 per cent safe institutional deliveries for reducing MMR and IMR.