BANGALORE: The State Cabinet on Wednesday decided to commence work on the buildings to house the circuit Benches of the Karnataka High Court in Dharwad and Gulbarga on Friday.

Minister for Primary and Secondary Education Basavaraj S. Horatti told presspersons here that the Cabinet decided to award contracts for the construction to the Royal Construction Company, Dharwad, and the State Construction Corporation, Gulbarga. The Cabinet decided to provide 100 acres of government land at Hessarghatta in Bangalore Rural district to set up a centre of the Ahmedabad-based National Institute of Rural Management (NIRMA). The Centre and the State Government would contribute Rs. 35 crore each to the project.

Padma awards

The Cabinet authorised Chief Minister H.D. Kumaraswmay and Deputy Chief Minister B.S. Yediyurappa to recommend names for Padma awards (2006-07) to the Centre. The last date for recommending names was October 1, Mr. Horatti said. The Cabinet approved the constitution of a third State Finance Commission for recommending devolution funds to urban local bodies and panchayat raj institutions. Mr. Kumaraswamy and Mr. Yediyurappa would identify the chairman and members of the commission. The Cabinet decided to give government aid to 62 junior colleges run by Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes. These colleges were opened during 1987-1997. This would entail an expenditure of Rs. 7 crore. To distribute uniforms to 21,000 schoolchildren under the Vidya Vikas scheme, the Cabinet decided to give Rs. 54.94 crore of workload to the Karnataka Handloom Corporation (KHDC), Mr. Horatti said.

The Cabinet cleared a Rs. 14.5-crore proposal to provide drinking water to 52 villages between Mysore and Hunsur. It cleared a Rs. 31-crore proposal for the construction of a building in Bangalore for the Revenue Department. The building would come up on one-acre land located between St. Martha's Hospital and the Cauvery Bhavan on District Office Road.

The meeting authorised the Bangalore Mahanagara Palike (BMP) to raise a loan of Rs. 250 crore for taking up infrastructure development. Mr. Horatti said the Cabinet decided to set up a sub-committee to fix minimum support prices for agriculture and horticulture produce.

Other Cabinet decisions included granting of Rs. 7.77 crore for a drinking water supply project at Holalkere in Chitradurga district, upgrading of the road between Hoskote and Guntapalli, releasing Rs. 2.90 crore subsidy for supply of maize to poultry farmers affected by avian bird flu, and placing the departments of Information, Tourism, Youth Services and Kannada and Culture under one secretary to government, he said.

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