Chief Minister Siddaramaiah on Wednesday said that Prime Minister Narendra Modi did not respond to the State’s concerns despite the Niti Aayog being made aware of the injustice done to the State in the distribution of drought relief funds.
Speaking to reporters at the Mysuru airport, the Chief Minister, who later visited Nanjangud and Gundlupet to address the Congress party’s thanksgiving rallies, said the PM did not cite anything about the State’s concerns in his speech. He said the Centre had been telling that the allocation to the State had been enhanced in the 14th Finance Commission and asking the State to make up for the deficiency in the allocation.
“It’s a fact that the allocation under the 14th plan had been increased but the allocation to the Centre-sponsored schemes had been drastically reduced. The funding had been cut by 20 to 80%. It earlier was 100%. Therefore, the State hasn’t gained much,” he argued.
Mr. Siddaramaiah said Karnataka was the second State having large tracts of dry land after Rajasthan. However, other States, including smaller ones, managed to get higher drought relief. “Gujarat has received ₹4,000 crore as drought relief while Maharashtra received ₹7,000 crore. Even Madhya Pradesh received ₹4,000 crore. Karnataka, however, received only ₹1,375 crore,” he said.
The CM said the issue of smaller States getting higher allocations for drought works was brought to the notice of Prime Minister. The State had sought ₹4,702 crore as per NDRF provisions but was sanctioned only ₹1,685 crore, he informed.
He said ₹3,310 crore relief was sought for the loss incurred during kharif season. “The State had appealed to the Aayog to at least sanction this amount but there was no response,” he replied.
State ready for GST
Mr. Siddaramaiah, who also holds the finance portfolio, said the State has no objection to the rolling out of GST from July. The UPA government had proposed the GST but Mr. Modi, who was then the Chief Minister of Gujarat, had opposed it, he claimed.
