The Hindu : Karnataka / Bangalore News : Ashraya: withdrawal of circular demanded

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Thursday, Jun 29, 2006

Karnataka

Karnataka - Bangalore

Ashraya: withdrawal of circular demanded

Staff Reporter

It is a blatant attempt to control gram panchayats, says Opposition

BANGALORE: The Opposition in the Legislative Council on Tuesday demanded the immediate withdrawal of the circular from the Housing Department issued last month, which effectively authorises participation of legislators in the selection of beneficiaries of the Ashraya Scheme by gram panchayats.

The Housing Minister's response, which was read out by the Minister for Forests C. Chennigappa in reply to a call attention notice from Pratap Chandra Shetty, Motamma, and V.S. Ugrappa (Congress), drew protests from the Opposition members. V.R. Sudarshan (Congress) said the circular was a blatant attempt to control gram panchayats and undermined their constitutional powers to select beneficiaries for the Ashraya Housing scheme, and attacked the spirit of decentralisation of powers to the gram panchayats. Ms. Motamma said the gram panchayats were empowered to select the beneficiaries, which was done through the gram sabha, an open forum that ensured transparency and accountability of the gram panchayats. There was no room or role for legislators in this exercise. Another point that the Congress members objected was the scheme of allotting points up to 14 on various criteria to select the beneficiaries. The Congress members argued that it was not right to interfere with a system, which was already in place to identify beneficiaries, on the basis of annual income.

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Karnataka