Terming the expenditure on the construction of government buildings in the State as ‘lavish’, BJP MLA and Opposition leader Jagadish Shettar urged the Public Works Department to begin thinking in ‘compact’ terms.
At a discussion on the PWD in the Legislative Assembly on Wednesday, Shettar pointed out the construction of palatial inspection bungalows and the judges quarters in the State. He suggested that they were ‘wasteful expenditures’.
“If you visit any of these inspection bungalows built by the PWD, the bathrooms are as big as the bedrooms. Even the judges quarters are so palatial,” Shettar said.
JD(S) floor leader H D Kumaraswamy interrupted the debate and admitted that the palatial judges quarters, built during his tenure as chief minister, was a mistake.
“We thought that if the judges get a larger space, then the cases will be disposed of by them quickly. But that did not work. It was a mistake on the part of the government to have constructed these massive quarters,” said a sarcastic Kumaraswamy.
Shettar attacked the Congress government and said the new regime had done nothing more than demolishing walls and paint a few buildings, after coming to power.
He asked the Public Works Minister H C Mahadevappa whether his department officials knew the meaning of green buildings.
“Painting the exteriors of a building green does not mean that it is a green building. There needs to be efficiency in the use of power within the building.
The department keeps constructing buildings in such a manner that the use of power and air conditioning is at its maximum. An example of this is the Kandaya Bhavan,” said Shettar.
The BJP attacked the government over the quality of roads in the State. MLA Umesh Katti said the PWD had not constructed the roads based on parameters of quality but on the parameters of their budgetary constraints.
JD(S) MLA H K Kumaraswamy said the government must consider the proposition of bringing a uniform Standard Rate in the materials required for construction of roads.
Mahadevappa said the government had recently set up an SR review committee which will look into the disparity of rates in each district and suggest the appropriate rates.
