Budget has ignored coastal districts: Oppn. parties

MLA D. Vedavyasa Kamath terms Budget growth-oriented

Opposition parties in the coast have criticised the State Budget presented on Friday saying it lacked foresight, did not propose employment generation schemes for the youth and has ignored coastal districts.

Communist Party of India (Marxist), Udupi district committee, said Chief Minister Basavaraja Bommai, who once was the district in-charge, appears to have forgotten about the district. He has ignored the long-pending demand for a government medical college as well as revival of the Brahmavara Sugar Factory, said district secretary Balakrishna Shetty in a statement. Six legislators and two Ministers from the district have failed to do justice to the district, he regretted.

Manjunatha Bhandary, MLC representing local bodies from DK-Udupi, in a statement, regretted that Mr. Bommai failed to enhance grants to gram panchayats and honorarium to panchayat members as demanded by legislators. No significant announcements were made to implement the National Education Policy, 2020, he said, adding that renaming existing government engineering colleges as Karnataka Institutes of Technology, was a cruel joke when the government could not run existing government colleges.

Democratic Youth Federation of India (DYFI) said the Budget had failed to propose schemes for employment generation for youth, who constitute the major chunk of the population. The promise to generate five lakh jobs through two Chief Minister’s Mega Integrated Industrial Township was as farce as Prime Minister Modi’s promise in 2014 to generate two crore jobs, said DYFI President and Secretary Muneer Katipalla and Basavaraj Poojara in a statement. It also failed to extend the National Employment Guarantee Scheme to urban areas, they added.

Mangaluru City South MLA D. Vedavyasa Kamath in a statement termed the Budget growth-oriented ushering in massive development for the coastal region. Proposals for Narayana Guru Residential Schools, working women hostels, Deen Dayal Upadhyaya hostels for backward class students etc., were welcome.

Mr. Kamath said the proposal for ₹840 crore World Bank-aided Blue Plastic Management Scheme to address plastic pollution of waterbodies in the coast in next five years would address plastic pollution in the region.