"It's unfortunate that no minister or secretary of the department concerned turned up for a meeting convened by my department on August 22/23 in Delhi to review schemes," Gehlot said at a press conference here.
"Some states have given utilisation certificates (on the expenditure of previous year's funds for the schemes) while others have not yet," the minister said.
He said if Jharkhand was represented in that meeting and had given the utilisation certificates, funds would have been cleared for this year.
Stating that Jharkhand could have political differences with the Centre or the BJP, Gehlot wondered why it should hamper people belonging to ST/OBC/handicap categories from getting welfare schemes under his ministry.
"...And they talk about federal structure," Gehlot said, apparently taking a dig at Chief Minister Hemant Soren's statement "It's a rape of federal structure" after he was hooted in presence of Prime Minister Narendra Modi on August 21 at a function here.
