By Bizodisha Bureau, Bhubaneswar, August 21, 2019: Odisha has utilized only 21 per cent of the District Mineral Foundation (DMF) as on June 30, 2019, officials said.

Odisha had mopped up Rs 7,909.25 for DMF, but only Rs 1,672.34 crore has been spent. The state has commissioned 12,605 projects under DMF, 3,617 of which are yet to take off. As many as 5021 projects have been completed and 3967 others are ongoing.

The sta is much behind others as nationwide pace of utilisation of DMF proceeds is pegged at 32 per cent. The sum allocated to 21 mineral rich states (as on June 2019) stands at Rs 25637.66 crore out of which Rs 8269.43 crore has been spent.

Among states, Chhattisgarh boasts of the best record in DMF funds utilisation- it has spent 65.3 per cent of the allocated amount of Rs 4364.86 crore. Most of the other states are also sluggish in using DMF funds.

DMFs have been created in each mineral producing district under the provisions of the amended Mines and Minerals- Development & Regulation (MMDR) Act, 2015. They are funded by contributions from the miners. Older mines have to fork out 30 per cent of the royalty while newer mines obtained through the auctions route after January 12 2015, the date of enactment of MMDR Act pay 10 per cent of the royalty.