BELAGAVI: Even as Revenue Minister Krishna Byre Gowda highlighted, what he claimed, were the comprehensive measures taken by the State Government to face the drought situation effectively in all the 223 affected taluks during a debate on drought in the Assembly, the Opposition BJP MLAs staged a walkout accusing the government of failing to initiate timely measures.
Ever since 137 taluks were declared drought-hit in the first phase on September 13 and the number rose to 223 taluks in November first week, Byre Gowda said, “The government came up with a series of initiatives to face the situation. We demanded the Centre to release Rs 18,171 crore to tackle drought in Karnataka and submitted a ‘drought memorandum’ to the Centre on September 22.
The Central team visited the affected areas in the state. While Andhra Pradesh declared drought on October 13 and Maharashtra on November 9, we declared drought in Karnataka much before that (September 13),’’ the minister said. He said 3,836 private borewells have been identified and attempts are also being made to use tankers to supply drinking water to affected villages.
Besides initiating measures to avoid migration of labourers in the affected areas, the minister said the government has implemented all possible drought-relief works.
“The cabinet sub-committee on drought met eight times until now and held video-conferences at regular intervals,’’ he said. However, the Opposition MLAs were unhappy with the minister’s reply on the drought situation and said not enough measures were taken by the government to tackle drought in many of the affected areas. They later boycotted the proceedings accusing the government of failing to face the situation effectively.