The health and family welfare department finally has a minister to oversee it functioning, after the exit of former minister B. Sreeramulu from the ruling BJP last year.
Taking over the reins of the department is young BJP leader, Aravind Limbavali, who is considered a powerful and sharp politician in party circles. Unlike many of his colleagues, he has strong political likes and dislikes. A civil engineering graduate, Mr Limbavali has climbed up the ladder the hard way by serving the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) and the Akhila Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishat (ABVP) before he entered mainstream politics. As an ABVP leader, he led the "Save Campus" campaign, intended to solve problems students were facing. Earlier, he had served as higher education minister but fell out with former chief minister B.S. Yeddyurappa and was dropped from the cabinet.
In an interview with Deccan Chronicle, Mr Limbavali discussed the affairs of the BJP and the crucial issues in the health department.
Here are some excerpts:
You have assumed charge of a major department at a time when dengue has reared its head in the city. How do you tackle this?
This is not an epidemic. The musquito carrying the bacteria does not go beyond a distance of 100 metres where it is born. Our department has been closely working with urban local bodies including BBMP to check the disease. I appeal to people that if fever does not subside, they should go for a blood test. There is no medicine for this. When the platelet count comes down the blood thickens. Providing fluids is the only remedy besides giving medicines for fever. From Monday, BBMP is launching a massive campaign to undertake larvae tests. The BBMP has agreed to form 200 batches which will visit 1,000 houses every day.
You face a challenge in containing tobacco consumption and AIDS.
Right now, I am attending to issues which have taken the proportions of a crisis. Tobacco use and AIDS will be taken up later.
You might have your own dreams for the department. Can you elaborate?
I would like to expand the Vajpayee Arogyashree health insurance scheme to the entire state. We are considering giving an option to people who could avail treatment upto Rs 1.5 lakh any time in four years. In other words, people will be given the flexibility to utilise the assistance earmarked for the future to meet a medical emergency during the current financial year. We have plans to expand the 108 ambulance service to rural areas. We want to develop a software for drug supply. Right now, we do not have a system to ensure the availability of drugs at primary health centres. We would like to develop the software so that when medicine stocks get exhausted, the drugs department should get an automatic alert. We would like to go for an online system. I am also considering streamlining the recruitment of specialists for district and taluk hospitals.
Moving on to politics, you had worked in the BJP for over a decade and held important posts. Even after effecting a change of guard, the party could not put an end to groupism. How do you gauge the crisis in the BJP?
I feel the party has grown manifold and has become an ocean now. The issue before us is how to train the newcomers. I do not want to distinguish outsiders and insiders. Once you join a party, you belong to the organisation. When these leaders joined us, they wanted to know about the BJP’s culture and how it functions? We did not take their queries seriously. Had we done this and enlightened them about the party structure, ideology, and ethics, we could have avoided what are seeing now. In the absence of training and guidance, they brought their old style of functioning from the parties they were associated with, to the BJP. Many from our party who are new, tried to emulate them. After Mr K.S. Eshwarappa returned as party president, the organisation started functioning properly. Otherwise, legislators like me and C.T. Ravi would not have got berths in the government.
But the crisis seems to be persisting despite changing the CM. There is talk of former chief minister, B.S. Yeddyurappa quitting the party. What do you think?
I don’t think so. Mr Yeddyurappa was the party president in the past. He became deputy chief minister and later chief minister. He has occupied almost all posts here. He has the experience to guide us on providing effective government. Where will he go? I do not think he will quit the party which he has built.
Your party seems to be heavily banking on the Lingayat factor. Your party national president, Nitin Gadkari mentioned this while defending the change of guard. Don’t you think other communities will move away if you adopt such a strategy?
We are not a party of one community. This time, the party adopted the LKG model. Besides, there are a large number of OBC, SC and ST ministers in the cabinet. Our party respects the sentiments all communities. At the same time, we cannot wish away the caste system being practised by society. We cannot grow without this system. We cannot ignore or wish away public sentiment too.