Arjun: OBC poser

New Delhi, Oct. 15: Funds released for implementing OBC quotas at central universities are lying unutilised, the finance ministry has complained to Arjun Singh.

Arjun’s human resource development ministry, which shepherded the controversial reservations, is preparing for an emergency meeting with top administrators of the universities by next week to scrutinise their balance sheets, government officials said.

This year’s budget allocated Rs 2,522 crore for the implementation of OBC quotas at the country’s higher educational institutions — roughly a third of Rs 7,600 crore allocated for higher education.

Most of these institutes, however, have not spent a rupee of their quota amount, sources said.

The quota funds are to be used to build infrastructure — hostels, lecture halls, library space — and to hire fresh faculty for 54 per cent additional students who are to join existing institutions.

The OBC reservation law requires each higher educational institution to reserve 27 per cent seats for backward class students by increasing an equal number of seats to ensure there is no reduction in opportunities for general-category students. Each institute will have to increase its seats by 54 per cent by 2011 to meet this goal.

In a September 23 note, the finance ministry’s adviser to the HRD ministry has expressed “deep concern” over the underutilisation of the OBC quota funds, the sources said. The adviser asked the ministry to urgently collect the latest details on such expenditure by individual universities, they said.

The HRD ministry then decided to convene the special meeting of officials from all central universities and other varsities supported by the University Grants Commission (UGC), a senior official said.

“It is embarrassing for us at the HRD ministry when universities do not utilise funds allocated to them for a project that we have pushed so hard,” the official conceded.

At the meeting, ministry officials plan to question university administrators on the finance ministry’s complaint, the sources said.

“We will seek details of how much they have spent as a percentage of the amount they have received. More critically, administrators will be quizzed on where and how the money has been spent. You could call it an emergency in-house audit,” a senior official said.

Of the Rs 2,522 crore allocated for the implementation of OBC quotas this year, Rs 875 crore have been earmarked for universities and the remaining Rs 1,647 crore for technical institutions like the IITs and the IIMs.