Bengaluru, May 5 (DHNS): Legislative Assembly Speaker K B Koliwad has put on hold a multi-state ‘study tour’ planned by legislators at government expense.

As many as 18 legislators had planned to embark on a week-long tour of Delhi, Gujarat, Jammu and Kashmir, Maharashtra and Bihar from May 9. The proposed tour had come in for criticism from various quarters as it was felt that the legislators should concentrate on drought relief in their constituencies.

“The legislature session will be held in June. I have told them to wait till the conclusion of the session. We will take an appropriate decision by then,” Koliwad said. The cost per head of the proposed tour would have been around Rs 3 to Rs 5 lakh, official sources said.

A foreign junket organised for legislators in the name of study tour had come in for severe criticism in 2014. The then Speaker Kagodu Thimmappa had constituted a committee to frame guidelines to regulate such tours. The panel had recommended that tours can be undertaken only for a specific purpose.