First full-fledged budget fails to impress

Leaders term the State budget ‘pro-rich, anti-poor’

Warangal: The annual budget for 2015-16 presented in the Telangana State Assembly by Finance Minister Eatala Rajender on Wednesday has disappointed the public here.

Majority of leaders of political parties, intellectuals, student activists and employees have expressed displeasure over the budget allocations and called it as a ‘pro-rich and anti-people budget’.

Communist Party of India (CPI) district secretary Sarampally Vasudeva Reddy opined that the budget was aimed at promoting real estate and construction industry. The budgetary allocations would not help fulfill the election promises made by the TRS government.

It was estimated that 70 percent of the population in the State was Below Poverty Line. Sadly, there was specific plan of action to tackle it. Similarly, the national average of literacy rate was 74 percent whereas the Telangana state had just 58 percent of literacy rate. Yet, the government had not proposed measures to address the problem, he said.

“It seems the State government was seriously lacking priorities in the allocation of funds. It is proved by lump sum allocation of funds for pending irrigation projects. There is no emphasis on completion of Sriram Sagar, Devedula and Kanthanapelli irrigation projects,” Vasudeva Reddy added.

The same was the case of the much-hyped free KG to PG education programme, housing to poor, compensation to farmers who committed suicides due to crop loss and women and child welfare, he added.

Telangana activist Sadu Rajesh said the budget fulfilled the aspirations of the people partially. Emphasis was laid on giving big figures but there was no well-defined approach towards achieving the targets.

The government which allocated Rs 100 crores to a temple made meagre allocation to higher education.

Telangana movement was successful because of the role played by universities.

Allocation of funds to Osmania University and other universities would not help their progress. There was no plan of action to fill up vacancies in the universities.

Excess stress on industries and negligence of agriculture sector was not good as the number of people depend on agriculture for their livelihood were more in comparison to industrial sector, he noted.

Similarly, undue emphasis was laid on Hyderabad but other districts were not given their share in the funds allocation for their development.

The State government should have taken up a comprehensive approach towards development of all the districts in the State, Rajesh pointed out Telangana Lecturers Forum Telangana secretary Tirunahari Sheshu noted that public expected a radical budget but it looked average one. Rs 8,000 crore for agriculture would not suffice and there were no measure to address farmer’s suicides.

There was an imbalance in allocation to health and education sectors and allocation of Rs 2,083 crore to Mission Kakatiya might not be sufficient to achieve the goals, he added.

The leaders averred that the proposal to development an industrial corridor between Warangal and Hyderabad would only help the industrialists and real estate business. Non allocation of funds for Kaloji Health University and the proposed Textile Hub was grave injustice to Warangal.