Bhubaneshwar: Claiming that the people of Odisha are ‘shocked’ over the Centre’s alleged negligence to the state’s demand on rural housing even as the allocation for Prime Minister Awas Yojana has increased for other states, Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik on Tuesday said he hoped Centre would rectify the ‘injustice’ being meted out to the ‘poor and the tribal’ people of the state. Reacting to the Union budget presented by Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman in Parliament, Patnaik, in a video message, said Odisha is the only state in the country that is more frequently affected by natural calamities, and “our repeated demand for special consideration in this regard has not been addressed in the budget.”
However, the Chief Minister lauded the Union Budget’s focus on technology and infrastructure-led growth, and said will have a positive impact. He stated that proposed technology-led development in health and education will help the country to a large extent in this pandemic situation.
“The Production Linked Initiative schemes in fourteen sectors and extension of Emergency Credit Line Guarantee Scheme would be helpful in mitigating supply side constraints,” the Chief Minister said.
Further pointing out the “deficiencies” of the budget, Patnaik said reduction in MGNREGS in a pandemic situation is not going to help poor people. “Already, there are serious issues of offtake by FCI leading to dislocation in paddy procurement. Further, reduction in food subsidy under NFSA will put farmers in serious trouble. This needs to be reconsidered,” he said
He also critisised the government for slashing the sectoral allocation in sectors like agriculture and farmers welfare, higher education, rural development and women and child development and said this could ‘hamper’ inclusive growth.
The Chief Minister pointed that middle class and poor people are heavily impacted by price rise and inflation, and budget has not addressed price rise being faced by people. “To compound this further, there is a sharp decline in LPG subsidy. This will affect household economics very badly and women will bear the brunt of LPG price rise,” he said.
Noting that more than 20 percent of the Union Taxes are proposed to be collected through levy of cess and surcharge, Patnaik against the spirit of co-operative federalism.”The increasing level of Cess and Surcharge is shrinking the mandated transfers of share tax due to the states,” he added.
He expressed happiness over Centre’s recognisation of the importance of millet in the Union Budget in the context of declaration of 2023 as International Year of Millets by United Nations, and pointed out that “Odisha Millet Mission” has been a game changer in promoting nutritional security and augmenting farmer’s income. He also welcomed the step to increase the allocation under Jal Jivan Mission and PMAY.
