The Comptroller and Auditor General of India has criticised the Council for Advancement of Peoples Action and Rural Technology (CAPART) for failing to reach the unserved areas of country, most of the districts identified as backward by the Planning Commission under the Rashtriya Sam Vikas Yojana.

The CAG in its report said that the geographical distribution of the projects was uneven with 51 percent of funds released during 2003 to 2009 going to the six states of Andhra Pradesh, Bihar, Haryana, Karnataka, Orissa and Uttar Pradesh.

CAPART was set up in 1986 with a mandate to propagate appropriate rural technologies for the benefit of the rural poor.

This was to be achieved mainly by promoting voluntary action through funding support for innovative, need-based projects, encouraging collaboration amongst voluntary organisation, and selecting, encouraging and disseminating innovative technologies.

It received financial assistance of ` 358.36 crore from the Union Rural Development Ministry from 2003 to 2009. Out of this, an expenditure of `259.49 crore was incurred in implementation of various schemes- Advancement of Rural Technology Scheme, Public Co-operation, Disability Action, Watershed Development, Organisation of Beneficiaries and others.

During the field visits of audit, it was found that execution of projects was not as per sanctions. The project monitors reports on assets created with CAPART assistance were at variance with the field audit findings.

CAPART had filed FIRs in only 62 out of 659 blacklisted cases. Although Ministry of Rural Development had intimated Public Accounts Committee that CAPART had taken action for deregistration of some of the blacklisted voluntary organisations, it failed to provide data in this regard to audit raising doubts over claims of such action.