RAGIHALLI : For residents of Ragihalli, a village located about 50 km from Bengaluru near the Bannerghatta National Park, late Member of Parliament from Bangalore South HN Ananth Kumar is still their MP. Though the village comes under Bangalore Rural LS constituency, the residents here have always felt Ananth Kumar as their representative at the national level.
The reason for the late Union minister being still etched in their memories is that he had adopted the village under the Sansad Adarsh Gram Yojana in 2014.
From concrete roads to toilets at every home, Ragihalli has a drinking water plant, a government school, a nationalised bank, a well-equipped panchayat office, an ATM, a systematic diary which collects milk from each household and no garbage anywhere.
According to the resident, they got all these facilities “because of MP Ananth Kumar.” “He was our MP and we feel abandoned after his sudden demise,” says Shivarudra, a resident. The residents say they are in a state of dilemma whether to vote in the LS polls are not. “What is the guarantee that the person we vote for will turn up and continue with the development works?”asks Durgappa, another villager.
“Even now after the demise of Ananth Kumar, if we need any help we approach his wife Tejaswini through our panchayat officers. She used to visit our village even in the absence of her husband when he was busy in national politics,” says a villager.