CPM Rajya Sabha MP from Kerala John Brittas has objected to the new draft guidelines on the Members of Parliament Local Area Development Scheme (MPLADS) that makes the use of Hindi mandatory on project plaques and seeks to centralise the control of funds.

Brittas alleged that this was an “infringement of federal principles” and sought changes to the draft.

He has written to the minister of state for statistics and programme implementation, Rao Inderjit Singh, complaining that the new draft guidelines “surreptitiously tries to introduce a new stipulation of erecting a plaque at MPLADS project sites inscribing the details of work in Hindi language as well”.

Usually, the plaques mentioning the details of the project are written in English and the language of the respective state. The existing guidelines make no stipulation on what language should be used for the plaques.

The move comes at a time non-Hindi states, especially in the south, have raised strong objections to the Union government’s alleged attempts to impose Hindi at central government departments and centrally run educational institutions.

“Our Constitution starts with the sentence that ‘India, that is Bharat, shall be a Union of States’. I am quite certain that while resolving the above terms, our founding fathers would have borne in mind the need to protect, enrich and promote our cultural, linguistic and ethnic diversity,” Brittas wrote.

“It is only because of these salient features that our great nation has been revered among other countries as a unique nation spearheading the novel concept of ‘Unity in Diversity’,” he noted.

“As such, any enforced directive to depict the details of work in Hindi language in non-Hindi speaking states can only be considered as an infringement of federal principles,” Brittas asserted.

Elected and nominated members of both Houses of Parliament are entitled to recommend public projects worth up to Rs 5 crore each financial year.

While Lok Sabha members recommend projects in their respective constituencies, Rajya Sabha members can recommend projects in their respective states. Nominated members of either House can recommend projects anywhere in the country.

Brittas drew attention to other violations of federal principles in the draft guidelines that would replace the one revised in 2016.

The draft proposes to change the funds handling agency from the state and district nodal agencies to a Central Nodal Agency (CNA).

The letter quoted the relevant paragraph of the draft guidelines that states: “…That the actual fund shall only be with CNA account (and not the accounts of District Authorities), fund will be directly credited to vendors account as and when demands are raised electronically.”

Brittas also opposed the plan to make it mandatory for unspent funds to be transferred to the CNA instead of remaining in the accounts of the state or district nodal agency.

“As such, it can be discerned without an iota of doubt that the draft guidelines tries to proscribe the existent right of MPs to utilise the interest accrued in their respective individual accounts maintained by the Nodal District Authorities and that there is a clandestine attempt to infringe the principles of decentralisation by wresting the currently available rights and privileges of State Authorities to have funds in their accounts,” Brittas wrote.