This is how States are spending the Building & Construction Workers Welfare fund
Sai Krishna Muthyanolla
March 1, 2019
Factly had earlier written about the more than Rs. 28,000 crores of Building & Construction workers welfare cess lying unspent as of December 2018. More than Rs. 6000 crores is lying unspent in Maharashtra.
As noted in one of our earlier stories, more than Rs. 28,000 crores of the cess collected in the name of Building & other Construction Workers welfare is lying unspent as of December 2018. The data also reveals that the spending patterns are different in different states.
Maharashtra accounts for more than 20% of the unspent amount
As per data shared by the government, more than Rs. 1000 crores was collected in cess by 17 States/UTs.  Of these, only two states, Maharashtra & Karnataka collected more than Rs. 5000 crores each. In terms of the total amount spent, Karnataka tops the list with Rs. 4520 crores followed by Kerala which spent Rs. 1887 crores. Apart from these two, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh & Odisha are the four other states that spent more than Rs. 1000 crores of the collected cess. At least Rs. 500 crores was spent by 5 more states.
In terms of the amount remaining unspent, more than Rs. 6000 crores lies unspent in Maharashtra alone which is more than 20% of the total unspent amount across the country. More than Rs. 2000 crores lies unspent in Uttar Pradesh & Delhi while more than Rs. 1000 crores lies unspent in seven other states. Together, these 10 states/UTs account for about 80% of the total unspent amount.
In Assam, 75% of the funds were spent on activities other than Welfare
There is a variation in terms of the how  various states have spent the amount. The data shared by the government categorizes the amount spent as that spent on welfare (on schemes) and the amount spent on other than welfare (like administration etc.). Among the states that spent at least Rs. 100 crore from the cess, Assam spent 75% on other than welfare while Tamil Nadu spent around 29% on other than welfare activities. Maharashtra, which hardly spent 6% of the total collected cess, spent 28% of the amount collected on other than welfare activities. Out of the Rs. 403 crores spent by Maharashtra, Rs. 113 crores was spent on other than welfare activities. At an All India level, around 7% of the amount was spent on other than welfare activities. In each of Karnataka, Kerala, Madhya Pradesh & Rajasthan, the top four states in terms of the spending, the proportion of the amount spent on other than welfare activities is less than 10%.
An average of Rs. 5119 spent per registered worker at an All India level
If the average amount spent on welfare per registered worker is considered (among those states that spent a minimum of Rs. 100 crores on welfare), Karnataka tops with the list with an average amount of Rs. 28,369 per worker. This amount is more than 5 times the national average spending of Rs. 5119 per worker. Kerala is the only other state where the average amount is more than Rs. 10,000 per worker. Only four other states (Jammu & Kashmir, Punjab, Delhi & Rajasthan) spent more than the national average while all the other states spent less than the national average. Bihar spent only Rs. 1737 per worker, which is 1/3rd of the national average.
Featured Image: Labour Welfare