JOIN USSiddaramaiah 2.0 Cabinet to decide on 'guarantees' on May 20
The new Siddaramaiah-led Cabinet will decide on rolling out the Congress’ five poll guarantees in its first meeting scheduled on Saturday.
The Cabinet will meet after the oath-taking ceremony of CM-designate Siddaramaiah, deputy CM-designate D K Shivakumar and council of ministers.
Speaking to media persons here, Shivakumar said the new government with a thumping mandate will serve as the people’s voice. “The party is committed to implementing the five guarantees. We will discuss this in the first Cabinet meeting and keep our word,” he said.
When asked about the modalities for implementation of the five guarantees, Shivakumar ducked the question. “I will not talk about it as of now. We will implement it after discussing it at length. These guarantees do not belong to Shivakumar or Siddaramaiah. These are guarantees by the Congress,” he said.
The five guarantees are: ‘Gruha Jyothi’ under which all households will get free electricity up to 200 units, ‘Gruha Lakshmi’ to give Rs 2,000 to the woman head of every family, ‘Anna Bhagya’ for 10 kg rice to every BPL member a month, ‘Yuva Nidhi’ unemployment allowance for two years (Rs 3,000 for graduates and Rs 1,500 to diploma holders) and ‘Shakti’ free bus travel for women across Karnataka.
These guarantees are likely to cost more than Rs 50,000 crore. In the run-up to the Assembly election, union finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman said they would cost Rs 1 lakh crore to be rolled out.
Recently, senior Congress leader G Parameshwara, who headed the party’s manifesto committee, said, some guidelines would be formulated for the implementation of these guarantees. For instance, something like free electricity up to 200 units required some thought which could be worked out by the power minister, he had said.
As for the swearing-in ceremony, the Congress will invite BJP and JD(S) leaders as the event is not party-specific, Shivakumar said.