Deccan Herald
New Delhi, Feb 27: My love for Karnataka is such that I even made one leader from your state the prime minister of this country, Lalu said without taking the name of H D Deve Gowda.
The presentation of the railway budget by Minister Lalu Prasad began on a stormy note with BJP members from Karnataka demanding apology from him for his “dirty people” remark but the maverick politician disarmed the agitated MPs by stating that he had “high respect” for Kannadigas.
“My love for Karnataka is such that I even made one leader from your state the prime minister of this country”, Lalu said without taking the name of H D Deve Gowda.
Naming Deccan Herald’s report which had carried his “dirty people” remark [apparently made against the people of the State], the minister said he has already clarified the issue. He said it was not true he said these words.
“How can you expect such words from a person like me ? It is not true. I have high regard for the people of Karnataka. If I had no love for Karnataka, I would not have made a leader from your state the prime minister. It is a different matter that he did not stay with you as partner”, the minister said, indirectly referring to Gowda parting ways with BJP.
Soon after Speaker Somnath Chatterjee asked the minister to present his budget, the State BJP members led by Ananth Kumar started raising slogans, demanding his apology for his remark.
It was one railway budget which most states opposed in the House, barring Bihar, Tamil Nadu and Kerala. The UPA’s friendly Left MPs spared no effort to attack the minister for ignoring West Bengal. Shouting against the minister, the Left parties staged an angry walk out.
But there was a divide within the Left. The MPs from Kerala, happy that the state was promised a coach factory, did not join the walkout despite coaxing by their West Bengal friends.
NDA miffed
The budget angered the NDA to no end. The MPs from Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh, Orissa, Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh raised slogans against the minister for ignoring their states but it was not heard in the melee.
BJP MP from Karnataka Prahlad Joshi and others shouted “Lalu down, down” while staging the walk out.
Their Congress counterparts such as R L Jalappa too were unhappy but could not protest much. Congress MPs from several states got up from their seats to protest but they were pacified by Parliamentary Affairs Minister P R Dasmunsi.
Promises made to State not kept
Railway Minister Lalu Prasad perhaps failed to live up to his promise made just three days ago that he would do justice to Karnataka in his railway budget presented to Parliament on Tuesday.
There is not much to rejoice if new trains or projects within Karnataka are any indication.
However, there are quite a few new trains going to destinations outside Karn ataka: two tri-weekly Garib Raths (AC trains with reduced fares) from Bangalore to Kochuveli (Thiruvananthapuram) and Yeshwantpur-Puducherry.
Lalu also announced the introduction of the Bangal ore–Machalipatnam tri-weekly and Yeshwantpur-Jodhpur weekly trains. The Mysore-Nanjangud passenger will ply after gauge conversion. The Bangalore-Coimbatore express will be extended to Ernakulam, Chennai- Bangalore Express to Prashanti Nilayam, Solapur-Bagalkot Express to Gadag after gauge conversion and Dharwad-Gadag passenger to Bijapur.
The frequency of Bagalkot-Yeshwantpur Basava Express will be increased from tri-weekly to daily.
Work on the Harapanahalli-Harihar section of the Kottur-Harihar new line, Bagalkot-Gadag of Solapur-Gadag new line and Anandpuram-Talaguppa gauge conv-ersion will be completed during 2008-09.
With the last project, the Bangalore-Hubli and Birur-Shimoga-Talaguppa will be completed.
The minister said regarding the Kadapa-Bangalore gauge conversion project, the state governments have come forward to share the cost.
Of a host of new surveys announced, Karnataka will have only one, that too partly – the Srinivasapura-Madanapalli new line.
The minister announced that following encouraging results of the pilot project of Anti Collision Device (to stop head on and rear end collisions between trains), the system would be extended in the next two years to three zonal railways including the South Western Railway. In allocations too, there is nothing much to speak of. Among the new line projects, the Gulbarga-Bidar line (140 km) has been given Rs 20 crore out of the required Rs 184 crore. Only Rs 5 crore will be spent for the Munirabad-Mahaboobnagar line as against a whopping Rs 451 crore more required.
Indian Railways will spend Rs 30 crore — in addition to Rs 60 crore from the Karnataka government — on the 65-km Kottur-Harihar line. Only Rs 10 crore has been allocated for the decade-old Kadur-Chikmagalur-Sakleshpur line which still requires Rs 198 crore.
For the Hassan-Bangalore project (via Shravanabelagola), Rs 55 crore has been given but it still requires Rs 116 crore. Funds allocated for the Hubli–Ankola, Banglaore-Satyamangalam and Rayadurga-Tumkur are too meager to mention. Among the gauge conversion projects, Kolar-Chikkaballapur has been given Rs 70 crore and only Rs 9 crore more is required for its completion. The Hospet-Guntakal line has been given Rs 21 crore and it still requires Rs 83 crore.
The 300-km Solapur-Hotgi (Gadag) line has been given a royal sum of Rs 5 crore – though it requires just Rs 43 crore for completion.
The Rs 608-crore Mysore-Chamarajanagar line has been allocated Rs 20 crore as against Rs 459 crore required.
A good sum of Rs 50 crore has been given to the Arsikere-Birur doubling which needs Rs 47 crore for completion. Another lucky project is the Ramanagaram-Kengeri doubling and electrification which gets Rs 50 crore. The Rs 96-crore Dharwad-Kambarganvi too has been given Rs 50 crore.
The Bangalore-based Rail Wheel Factory gets Rs 25 crore for augmentation of its Rs 99-crore capacity project. It still requires Rs 28.3 crore for completion.