State to unveil housing scheme for lower, middle income groups

CM promises quality power supply to rural, urban areas

The Karnataka government will soon come out with a new housing policy to ensure that people from lower and middle income groups will have houses of their own, Chief Minister Jagadish Shettar informed the Legislative Assembly on Tuesday.

Replying to the discussion on the motion of thanks to the Governor’s address, Shettar said the government will unveil an “affordable housing scheme” soon.
He said the government had given priority to housing for the poor during the last five years. It had constructed 55,000 houses for the people of North Karnataka, who were affected by severe floods in 2009, he added.

The chief minister assured that the government will provide quality power in both rural and urban areas during summer.

“There was a power shortage a few weeks ago because of the closing down of the Udupi power plant due to technical glitches. The problem has now been set right,” Shettar said.

The State had taken up projects to increase the installed capacity from 8,660 MW to 13,504 MW over the course of the last five years, he explained.

He blamed the Centre for not responding to the state government’s plea for providing grants under the Pradhan Mantri Gram Sadak Yojana, a scheme launched by the  BJP-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA) government. 

“We had even agreed to provide 25 per cent cost sharing for taking up improvement of rural roads. However, the Centre has not responded to any of our pleas,” he said.

Meet on H-K

Shettar said he would soon convene a meeting of elected representatives for implementation of the special status provided under Article 371(J) of the Constitution to Hyderabad-Karnataka region.

He said that the Centre would not be sanctioning any special funds for the Hyderbad-Karnataka region because of its new status.

It is left to the state to implement development programmes with its own resources. He also said additional funds would be sought from the Centre for the region.
 
Regional imbalance

While participating in a discussion on the budget proposals for 2013-14, Leader of the Opposition Siddaramaiah said regional imbalance has increased while it should have been the other way round following the implementation of the Dr Nanjundappa committee report.

Even ‘Operation Lotus’ fuelled disparity among districts. Those legislators who joined the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) managed to get crores of rupees for their constituencies,” he said.

Shettar said Article 371(J) is not explicit regarding how the reservation in jobs should be carried out. “We need clarity on whether those who are from the Hyderbad-Karnataka region should be getting reservation in state-level jobs or is it limited only for those jobs in the region.

I have discussed this aspect with officials. I request the members to study this and come back to the House so that it would help in framing rules,” he said.

He explained that the State government would take a decision on providing compensation to sugarcane growers who had lost their crop due to drought. “The decision will be taken after an assesment is made about the extent of the damage,” the chief minister said.