PM leveraging elections with government projects: Surjewala

Bengaluru: The All India Congress Committee general secretary in charge of Karnataka has alleged that the BJP was trying to force the premature inauguration of many vital installations including national highways, metro rail lines and stations and airports in Karnataka. He told a press conference in the city today that Prime Minister Narendra Modi is trying to foist these projects for accrediting his party for development before the elections.

"PM Modi is in a hurry to open vital infrastructure projects of the country even before the completion of the projects obviously using the media events as a springboard to the limelight keeping in view the coming elections. This is also seriously jeopardising the safety aspects of the projects and puts the operational systems under stress and fatigue and result in inconvenience to the users" Surjewala said.

Prime Minister Modi has inaugurated the incomplete Terminal 2 of the Bengaluru International Airport. To date, it is not fully operational and will be able to see 'International Flight Operations' shifting to the Terminal only in 2 years (June 2024) Even all Domestic Airlines will start operations from the Terminal only by May June 2023.

The list of 'hurriedly or prematurely' launched or inaugurated projects in Karnataka by Prime Minister Narendra Modi includes -Shivamogga Airport at a cost of Rs.500 Crore on 27 February 2023. Till today there are no operational flights to Shivamogga and out of Shivmogga. On 12th March 2023; PM Modi inaugurated the Bangalore- Mysore National Highway. To date, it is incomplete with missing service roads, missing Underpasses, Overpasses, Light Vehicular Underpasses, and Pedestrian Underpasses, besides being waterlogged and accident-prone.

"Now we have understood that the PM will be inaugurating the Metro Line between Byappnnahalli to KR Puram to Whitefield Once again it is discontinuous, disjointed and disconnected. This is also a hurriedly and 'engineered' inauguration event keeping in view the coming elections.

In the event of the Metro Line being forcefully made operational prematurely it will cause undue hardships for Bengalureans and also puts the BMTC under pressure to deploy buses from its normal routes to the routes connecting Metro stations at Bayyappanahalli, KR Puram and Whitefield. The BMTC is already running short of 8000 buses due to which the Bengalureans are already facing difficulties in travelling.

Quoting a letter, given by the safety commissioner of BMRCL in February points out that there were 57 works which were in various stages of completion and commissioning. In such conditions, it is most likely to cause inconveniences and safety issues, which the PM has overlooked and agreed to inaugurate the 'nowhere to nowhere' metro line. Surjewala said.