From an ageing tiled-roof office to a swanky three-storeyed structure, the new Mini Vidhana Soudha at Sullia was officially declared open on Wednesday.
Construction on the Rs. 2-crore structure had started in 2007 with the objective of unifying all taluk-level offices in one building. The Soudha sits in the courtyard of the taluk office.
Apart from the soudha, Deputy Chief Minister K.S. Eshwarappa inaugurated a Rs. 90-lakh building for the new Sullia Government First Grade College, laid the foundation for a Rs. 1.5-crore extension for the college, Rs. 5.7 crore worth of works for developing 30.17 km of village roads in the taluk under the ‘Namma Grama, Namma Raste’ scheme, and a Sthree Shakti Bhavan, a town library. A Rs. 26-crore Special Package to carry out water sanitation, electrification, and other works in the taluk was announced. In all, projects estimated at Rs. 60 crore were inaugurated or announced on Wednesday.
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While the college is yet to shift to the new building – for the past seven years, it was being run from a government school in the town – its isolated location and distance from the town were concerns for some officials. Situated in the middle of groves, the college is around 1 km from the nearest road. “We will make travel arrangements for children shortly,” said Malleswami, Block Education Officer.
Mr. Eswarappa said that out of all the rural districts in the State, Sullia had been given the most grants. Apart from the electoral promises of better governance, allocation of more projects to rural areas and welfare schemes for the economically-backward, the Deputy Chief Minister said that if the BJP was elected to power, Sullia MLA S. Angara would be made a Minister.
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He added that the government had amended the laws to allow regularisation of Kumki land that would benefit four lakh farmers, while also hiring 1,340 surveyors to carry out large-scale demarcation of land belonging to the Revenue Department and Forest Department in the State.
Mr. Angara said that Rs. 198 crore had been allocated to the taluk for development works, of which works estimated at Rs. 98 crore had commenced.
Congress workers stage protest
Several members of the Congress taluk unit were taken into custody on Wednesday after they protested in front of the taluk office against the BJP government for not inviting Congress leaders for the public inauguration of the works there.
Shouting slogans against BJP MLA S. Angara, the workers said that it was “election politics” that saw only BJP leaders and workers invited to the programme.
Responding to this, Mr. Angara called the protest a “drama”. “The BJP government has initiated these development works, and the Congress workers want to take credit for them. We have followed the protocol,” he said.