Mallikarjun Kharge

SHIMOGA: State Congress president M. Mallikarjun Kharge said here on Friday that the State Government should stop spending on the other programmes and utilise funds for flood relief on a priority basis instead of blaming the Centre for delaying release of assistance.

Addressing a press conference, he said there were certain formalities to be followed before the release of Central assistance to meet the situation arising from natural calamities. Funds could not be released before the Central study teams visited the affected areas and submitted their reports, he added.

He said the State Government could seek reimbursement instead of waiting for the Centre to release funds.

When questioned how the Centre could release assistance to Congress-ruled States such as Maharashtra and Andhra Pradesh, Mr. Kharge said they had made representations to the Centre before the Karnataka Government.

Referring to the all-party delegation that the State Government took to Delhi to seek Central assistance, he said the Government did not seem to be serious about flood-related problems as it had included other issues such as implementation of the proposed Kalasa Banduri project and the border dispute between Karnataka and Maharashtra in the memorandum submitted to the Centre.

Mr. Kharge said the State Government would have received Central assistance had it followed the procedure properly. "There is a method to apprise the Centre on the flood situation," he said. "The ruling party and the Opposition are one as far as tackling natural calamities is concerned and we do not like to politicise these issues," he said.

Criticising the manner in which the coalition Government was tackling flood-related problems, Mr. Kharge said, "When coalition partners are at logger heads and engrossed in keeping intra-party differences under check how could they find time to tackle such problems."

Mr. Kharge said he and his party leaders were touring the State to mobilise support for the State-level convention of party workers to be addressed by UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi in Bangalore on September 3.

Leader of the Opposition and former Chief Minister N. Dharam Singh said the Government should have utilised Rs.120 crore allocated in the budget for flood relief. He said the Centre released Rs. 357 crore as assistance to the State on time last year as the proper procedure was followed then.

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