Accusing the State government of going slow on his pet schemes of Bhagya Lakshmi, Sandhya Suraksha and Suvarna Bhoomi, the former Chief Minister B.S. Yeddyurappa on Friday said he would lead a “Vidhana Soudha chalo” protest in Bangalore on December 26 to “wake up Chief Minister Jagadish Shettar and his government from the deep slumber”.
He served a week’s ultimatum to Mr. Shettar to release adequate funds for these schemes failing which he would launch an indefinite day-and-night satyagraha against the government in January first week.
Announcing this at a press conference here on Friday, Mr. Yeddyurappa said the district units of his Karnataka Janata Paksha would stage demonstrations in all the district centres on December 26 seeking release of funds for the projects.
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He remarked that the Shettar government was as good as dead for the people. “The Vidhana Soudha is empty. The Chief Minister does not have time to the tour the State to know people’s problems as he is in poll mood. Even Chief Secretary S.V. Ranganath has forgotten his duty. Irrespective of whether there is any government or not, he should have executed his responsibilities properly. The Secretary-level officers should have made efforts to know what is happening in the districts allotted to them,” he said.
He alleged that the State was in such a pitiable condition that neither the government nor the Opposition were working effectively.
Donning the role of the Opposition leader, Mr. Yeddyurappa alleged that about 60,000 mothers of girl children from BPL families were yet to get bonds under the Bhagya Lakshmi scheme for the last six months. Only 97,484 bonds had been issued under the scheme in 2011-12 under the new dispensation as against 3.21 lakh in 2009-10 when he was Chief Minister, he said.
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Similarly, 10.92 lakh beneficiaries were waiting agonisingly to get social security pension schemes like Sandhya Suraksha while the scheme to provide an incentive of Rs. 2 per litre of milk to farmers too was affected as the government was yet to release Rs. 90 crore for the last three months, he said. He further charged the government with failure to release sufficient funds for the Suvarna Bhoomi scheme meant for small and marginal farmers.
Mr. Yeddyurappa announced that he would embark upon a State tour from December 28 from Bidar. In the first phase, he would tour Bidar, Gulbarga and Yadgir districts. The KJP intended to enrol 25 to 30 lakh members in two months, he said.