Nodal officers to monitor TN welfare schemes at district-level

CHENNAI: In a bid to further strengthen the monitoring mechanism with regard to the welfare schemes at district-level, Tamil Nadu government has designated high-level authorities at deputy collector level as field nodal officers.

Accordingly, various tasks were given to the nodal officers, who will also conduct field inspections at least four days a month.

A senior official from the Special Programme Implementation department said that his department is discharging the primary responsibility of monitoring body of the government by collecting data from the departments concerned to monitor the implementation status welfare measures.

He said based on the information furnished by the departments, Special Programme Implementation department prepares progress reports for important coordination meetings and analytical reports for high level review meetings that are conducted from time-to-time.

"However, in order to further strengthen the monitoring mechanism at district level, this department has designated select officers in the cadre of Deputy Collectors or Assistant Directors in each district, as field nodal officers,” he added.

Stating that the officers will undertake field inspections in the allotted districts, at least four days a month, he said they will cover all those schemes, programmes and projects during the inspection, that are specifically assigned by the government.

"During the inspections, the nodal officers have to verify the genuineness of the beneficiaries under various welfare schemes, actual stage of works under implementation and also to report the incidental findings, if any,” he said adding that they will also verify whether the schemes are being implemented as per the guidelines and instructions in force.

The official said that to document best practices, if any, that are being followed in the field that have better quality outcomes or contribute to speedy implementation of the works, for consideration of the government for replication in other areas.

"They will also report any malpractices, issues, bottlenecks in the implementation of programmes for rectification and appropriate action,” he said adding that the nodal officers should be fair in the inspection process without any bias and will send their field inspection reports immediately.