BHUBANESWAR:As the monsoon session of the Assembly may turn out to be the last session before next elections, the State Government has decided to bring a huge supplementary budget of Rs 12,768 crore to accommodate all the schemes announced by it.
The ruling BJD is anticipating that next Lok Sabha elections will be advanced to December by the Centre. If the Lok Sabha polls will be held by the year-end, political observers believe that Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik is likely to advance the Assembly polls. Odisha had simultaneous Lok Sabha and Assembly elections in 2014.
Apart from the State Government’s move to place a huge supplementary budget, activities of all the three major political parties have led to the talk of an early poll. While the Chief Minister has already covered 193 blocks in the ‘Ama Gaon, Ama Bikash’ programme through which he directly interacts with the villagers, president of the Odisha Pradesh Congress Committee (OPCC) Niranjan Patnaik has embarked on a visit of southern districts considered to be a strong base of the party.
Meanwhile, there has been signs of activities in the BJP camp after the party faced the allegation of having tacit understanding with BJD during election to deputy chairperson of Rajya Sabha. The proposed visit of Prime Minister Narendra Modi to the State on September 22, during which he is scheduled to address public meetings at Jharsuguda and Talcher, is considered as a boost to the morale of the party rank and file.
Meanwhile, sources said, the supplementary budget will include provisions for recently announced schemes like the Biju Swasthya Kalyan Yojana and the State Food Security Scheme besides the routine allocations for centrally sponsored schemes, Central sector schemes and the State Government’s own schemes.The monsoon session will start on September 4 and the supplementary budget will be placed on September 5.
All-party meet today
Assembly Speaker Pradip Amat has convened an all party meeting on Monday to discuss the schedule for the monsoon session and seek cooperation of all political parties to run the House smoothly. Issues to be raised by the three major parties - BJD, Congress and BJP - will be decided in the respective legislature party meetings on Monday.