BENGALURU: The results of a consultation with people to elicit their opinion on development of the state is set to eventually make its way into the Congress manifesto for the 2018 elections. The Nava Karnataka 2025 or Vision 2025 was launched on Monday, for charting out a development road map for the next seven years.The road map will be created by consulting all stakeholders in every district for the next three months and get their opinion on problems, solutions and what they wish the focus should be on.
Inaugurating the project, Chief Minister Siddaramaiah said that gathering people’s opinion would very important and it would help them add some of the goals to their manifesto.“This is a new kind of thinking. If we want to create a new Karnataka, then we should know what the people are thinking, what are they projects they want, their problems and solutions. We do not want to sit here in Bengaluru and do that. We want to have a discussion with people and know what they think,” he said.
He added that the state was on target on several developmental goals, whether it was eliminating hunger, creating employment or decreasing malnutrition among children. “One of our goals is to be open defecation free (ODF) and the state needs to construct 55 lakh toilets for this purpose. We have already constructed more than 30 lakh toilets and in 2018, Karnataka will be declared as ODF state,” he claimed.
Asked about how the state was going to factor in decreasing Central grants for many of the schemes, Siddaramaiah said they expected grants from the Centre, but if there was a considerable decrease in grants, the state was still going to implement the programmes.
The Vision 2025 exercise will cover 13 sectors including agriculture and allied sectors, infrastructure, industrial development, education, employment, health and nutrition, rural development, social justice,
urban development, IT&BT and governance.