The Hindu : Karnataka / Bangalore News : Schemes in budget announced with eye on polls, says Siddaramaiah

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Wednesday, Jul 23, 2008
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Karnataka

Karnataka - Bangalore

Schemes in budget announced with eye on polls, says Siddaramaiah

Bangalore Bureau

Former Deputy Chief Minister says development will be badly hit

Budget has not offered schemes for benefit of farmers
Meagre allocation to several sectors criticised

Siddaramaiah

Bangalore: The former Deputy Chief Minister Siddaramaiah, who served as Finance Minister in two Governments, on Monday hit out at the State Budget and said that development works would be badly hit. The populist schemes in the budget were announced with an eye on elections, he said.

In his speech on the budget in the Legislative Assembly, he said Chief Minister B.S. Yeddyurappa, who is also Finance Minister, had “failed the people” of the State by making meagre allocations to several important sectors such as health and education, public works, rural development and irrigation. “The Chief Minister has no vision and programmes for accelerating the economic growth rate of the State,” he said.

He said the Government’s revenue surplus declined from Rs. 4,120 crore in 2007-08 to Rs. 1,527 crore in 2008-09. The fiscal deficit has not been maintained within the limits of 3 per cent of the Gross State Domestic Product as prescribed under the Karnataka Fiscal Responsibility Act of 2002. Further, the Government has proposed to borrow Rs. 6,018 crore from the market to meet its planned expenditures. “Loans should be taken on the basis of affordability of the State and not on the availability in the market,” he said.

Commercial tax collection, which registered an increase of 30 per cent in 2004-05, dropped to 20 per cent in 2007-08, he said. More money could be spent on social services only by generating more revenue, and commercial taxes are the biggest contributor to the State’s revenue, he said. The Government has decided to grant cooperative institutions’ loans to farmers, weavers and fishermen at the rate of 3 per cent. The nationalised commercial banks should also grant loans at 3 per cent to farmers. Further the Rs. 500 crore allocated for the revolving fund for market intervention in agriculture should be doubled, the former Deputy Chief Minister said.

Mr. Siddaramaiah said the ban on the manufacture and sale of arrack had rendered 1.5 lakh persons unemployed across the State. The Government should provide necessary permits to these unemployed youth to open 1,000 liquor shops (CL – 2) and 500 additional bars and restaurants (CL-9) during the current year as proposed in the budget. The consumption of liquor has increased from 12 lakh cases in 2005 to 36 lakh cases in 2008 a month, he said.

Noting that the budget had not offered programmes for the benefit of farmers, Mr. Siddaramaiah said allocations had been reduced to the irrigation sector.

A sum of Rs. 30,000 crore would be required for completing all ongoing projects in the State. But the Government had allocated merely Rs. 3,469 crore, which was insufficient to achieve the target. Similar was the case with the implementation of the Nanjundappa Committee Report on Regional Imbalances. An allocation of Rs. 2,547 crore would not suffice, he said.

He demanded higher allocation for drip irrigation and agriculture infrastructure such as establishment of cold storages and markets. The decision to provide free power to irrigation pumpsets up to 10 HP from next month would not benefit farmers as the State was facing severe power crisis.

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