CM holds marathon meet, asks officers to go to dists

Officers working in districts cannot take unnecessary leaves for the next three months in view of the severe drinking water crisis, Chief Minister B S Yediyurappa said on Friday.

Cracking the whip, Yediyurappa held a marathon 8-hour meeting with regional commissioners, deputy commissioners and Zilla Panchayat chief executive officers at Vidhana Soudha during which he reviewed the drought situation among other issues.

Over 1,200 villages are dependent on tanker water supply and over 1,700 on private borewells. Yediyurappa directed Chief Secretary T M Vijay Bhaskar to visit each district once in a month. “Also, secretaries have to visit the districts they are in charge of at least two times in a month for a review and report to the chief secretary and the revenue secretary,” Yediyurappa told reporters. “There’s no exemption. All must visit districts. This will help understand the ground reality and address problems,” he said.

Farmers who have dug borewells will be asked to grow green fodder on their land. “We have decided to pay farmers Rs 4,000 per tonne of fodder, up from Rs 3,000 per tonne,” he said.

A total of 43.75 lakh farmers in the state have enrolled under the PM-Kisan scheme to receive Rs 6,000 yearly. Of them, 31.72 lakh have already received the amount. “This makes our job easier. The Centre has identified the farmers. In the next 10 days, the state government will give farmers an additional Rs 4,000 in two instalments,” he said.