Chief Minister Siddaramaiah on Thursday raised the issue of “glaring discrimination” in allocation of funds to Karnataka under the State Disaster Response Fund (SDRF) between 2015-16 and 2015-20 with the Centre, and demanded removal of the disparity.
Mr. Siddaramaiah called on Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh and informed him that the State has been allocated ₹1,527 crore under the SDRF, which was significantly lower than other States such as Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu, Rajasthan, and Gujarat.
Karnataka has the second largest drought region after Rajasthan in the country. He said in the last 16 years, the State has been facing drought for the last 13 years.
During 1990-2005 period, the SDRF was 3.2% (₹1,435.95 crore) of the total allocation for Calamity Relief Fund against the total allocation of ₹43,750 crore. However, during 2015-20, the percentage of allocation was 2.4% of the total allocation, despite increasing frequency of disasters and higher spending by the State government towards disaster management.
Moreover, the revised manual of Drought Management, 2016, would drastically reduce Central aid. The revised manual excludes ‘moderately drought-affected’ taluks to avail assistance under the National Disaster Response Fund (NDRF).
On July 24, Mr. Siddaramaiah had written to Prime Minister Narendra Modi stating that “stringent parameters/eligibility conditions will make it difficult for the State government to declare taluks with significant crop loss as ‘severely-drought’ affected.” He added that the new guidelines “will drastically reduce Central assistance in future. This will increase hardship for the farmers.” He urged Mr. Rajnath Singh to revisit the annual allocation of SDRF based on the hazard and vulnerability-risk profile of the State.
Mr. Siddaramaiah also called on Railway Minister Suresh Prabhu and urged him to expedite pending railway projects in Karnataka. He also sought early environment clearance from the Centre for the long-pending Hubballi-Ankola railway line that cuts through the Western Ghats.
The work on the Hubballi-Ankola railway line, which was first proposed in 1998, has been going slow since the Centre has not given environment clearance to the project. A high power committee of the Union Ministry of Environment and Forests has recommended environment clearance for the project, Mr. Siddaramaiah said.
