Siddaramaiah to get tough, corrupt to face heat

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Bengaluru: In a week’s time, Chief Minister Siddaramaiah, who announced he could present his first budget as a Congress chief minister on July 12, will sanction the prosecution of all corrupt officers from the ranks of the IAS and IPS, who have been indicted by the Lokayukta police in corruption cases, particularly illegal mining.
Interacting with editors of the print and electronic media here on Tuesday, the CM reinforced his commitment to governance and zero tolerance for corruption, saying “There are 130 cases pen­d­ing for sanction. After obta­ining a report from DPAR, the government will give the nod to prosecute them all.” Bengaluru will also get a bigger outlay in Siddaramaiah’s budget.
“Infrastructure development needs attention”, Chief Minister said. He promised to  look into the demand to extend the 11.30 pm deadline for bars and restaurants in Benga­l­uru, but made it clear that he would not allow live bands, dance bars and prostitution rings to operate.‘Agri budget ploy misleads farmers’
Chief Minister Siddaramaiah who holds the finance portfolio, will not be travelling the populist path when  he presents the state budget on July 12. There will be no separate agriculture budget on the lines of those presented by his predecessor B.S. Yeddyurappa.
Instead, Siddaramaiah announced at an interaction with editors on Tuesday that he will pay enough attention to agriculture to give an impetus to the sector. A separate agriculture budget is a misleading concept, the CM said claiming that it was a ploy adopted by previous governments to mislead farmers. Farmers should get seeds and fertilizer on time and they should have access to a better market to sell their produce. If this is not ensured, they will not be happy whether there is an agriculture budget or not, he said.
Siddaramaiah also revealed at the meeting that he had already started pre-budget meetings with various departments and had obtained proposals from each department. Besides agriculture, priority would be given to irrigation, RDPR, education, power and health in the budget.
Considering the poor infrastructure in Bengaluru, considered the IT hub of the country, the CM has decided to earmark more budgetary resources for the city this time.