After Bellary win, CM plans big for district

Bellary: The government has decided against holding a cabinet meeting in Bellary as promised during the recent by-election, but Chief Minister Siddaramaiah will hold  a public contact programme, Janothsava,  on September 29  in the mining town to help with its development, going by KPCC president, Dr G Parameshwar.

While energy minister, D.K. Shivakumar had promised to hold a special cabinet meeting in Bellary after the byelections to focus on its development,  Mr Siddaramaiah reportedly prefers to visit it with a group of ministers to learn of the people’s problems first-hand and announce special packages for its development as a gesture of gratitude for the party’s victory.

Special packages are not new to the district, however.  A Rs. 3,300-crore special package for Bellary  was unveiled in 1999 by the S M  Krishna government as a gesture of goodwill soon after Congress president, Sonia Gandhi, chose to retain  Amethi as her constituency and gave Bellary up  in the parliamentary elections that year. But today, a 500 MW thermal power plant near Kuditini is the only visible outcome of that package and people are still wondering where the rest of money released for schemes has gone .

Former  district in-charge minister,  Gali Janardhan Reddy, now behind bars on charges of illegal mining,  too had promised to bring investment of  Rs 2 lakh crore to the district from  the Global Investors' Meet-2010. Although as many as six steel giants like Brahmini Steels,  Arcellor Mittal and Posco  signed MoUs to set up steel plants around Bellary , none of these projects have actually  taken off.  People are sceptical about Mr Siddaramaiah’s promises Unless he makes  necessary provisions in the budget.