Daijiworld Media Network - Mangalore (JS)

Mangalore, Apr 4: MLC Ivan D'Souza addressed a press meet at his office in MCC here on April 4 and gave a brief summary on various questions raised by him during the session in Upper House.

Ivan D'Souza handed over a cheque of Rs 50,000 to Padmavathi and said "As her husband expired due to illness and expenses of hospital cost them Rs 1 lac. Considering this as a special case, I have given a this amount from chief minister's relief fund . As of now a total Rs 77.055 lac has been provided to the needy people of this district.From February 27 to March 31 Rs 13.05 lac has been sanctioned from chief minister's relief fund to different people for treatment purposes ."

have asked all the 60 questions out of total questions and taken answers. Notables ones are discussion on pros and cons of Kasturirangan report. This issue was discussed for about an hour. In zero hour regarding the incident of students who were stopped in Ullal while going on tour, to provide mining land to Kudremukh iron ore company, to provide Arogyabhagya and canteen facilities to retired police officials and adhaar card issue of students were raised and appropriate and clear answers were obtained." Ivan added.

He accused BJP and said "BJP came to power by promising to get back black money. But it has been 10 months since government has taken charge. Neither they have bought back black money nor they are speaking about it. They have conducted core committee meeting here in Karnataka but it is of no use. They have taken back the subsidy given to small boats on diesel and kerosene. Now the state government is giving subsidy at a cost of Rs 100 crore. BJP said they are pro farmer, but now they are set to get land acquisition ordinance which is anti farmer. According the new ordinance they need not take the consent from the farmer to acquire their land. Youth congress will protest against this and we will do 'Padayathre' on April 18."

"This government bought Janadan Yojna and they just collected Rs 14000 crore deposits to bank. This is the only achievement by BJP government. This has not at all helped the people.The grant from union government to the state has been reduced by 35% compared to previous UPA government. We demand the BJP leaders of our state to get the grant to our state".

He also said "I have demanded agriculture marketing and horticulture minister in upper house to form cashew farming policy. Cashew is grown in 70,397 hectares in the state but there is no cashew farming policy. The crop is grown in unscientific ways. This has affected the farmers and has resulted in importing of cashew seeds from other countries. The farms owned by government should be developed in PPP model and private farmers should be provided with quality and high yield cashew plants. Cashew plantation research centres should be opened in the state. Promotion grant given to cashew farming should be increased, thereby promoting cashew plantation and reducing the import of cashew seeds. This should be discussed in next session and cashew farming policy should be formed."

Deputy mayor Purushotham Chitrapura, Corporators Shashidar Hegde, Praveen Chandra Alva and Ex deputy mayor Kavita and others were present.