The State government has fixed norms for all city corporations for allocation of funds under the Rs. 100 crore released under the Chief Minister’s package for tier II cities.
Minister for Municipal Administration and Wakf Qamarul Islam told presspersons here on Sunday that according to the norms fixed by the State government, Rs. 55 crore is for taking up road and drainage works, Rs. 15 crore each for drinking water, and underground drainage projects, Rs. 10 crore for general works and Rs. 5 crore to the Police Department to improve the traffic management system.
Mr. Qamarul said the funds provided in the first and second instalments were spent in a haphazard manner. The State government had introduced these norms to remove anomalies in spending and to introduce uniformity in spending. He said the Gulbarga City Corporation had finalised the action plan for the third instalment and submitted it to the government for final approval. The Minister said instructions had been issued to the district authorities and Agriculture Department officials to initiate measures to tackle the drought-like situation owing to the delay in rainfall.
He said that farmers had hardly a few days left to take up sowing of short-duration cash crops such as green gram. In case of further delay in rainfall, the Agriculture Department would have to prepare a contingency plan to meet seed requirement for alternative crops such as red gram. Mr. Qamarul conducted a review meeting of the arrangements made here for peaceful observation of fasting during the month preceding Ramzan and Shravana.
He said that instructions had been issued to officials of the city corporation, water board and Gescom to ensure that the public did not face any difficulties during this period.
Priyank Kharge, Chittapur MLA, was present.
