Bangalore, once the jewel in the treasure of Karnataka, was in dire straits not long ago with urban and agrarian distress breathing over its neck. But, lo and behold, a savior has arrived, barely 100 days ago and clouds have already clearing the deck for the sunshine the famed garden city once had. The name of the helmsman is BS Yeddyurappa. Not only development, his political astuteness is all too evident. He has consolidated his majority in the house from wafer thin to comfortable one.
It is measure of his leadership quality that there seems to be scramble among MLAs of Congress and JD(S) to join BJP fold. A number of MLAs from both the parties have already joined BJP. The crafty HD Deve Gowda and his likes seem to be at their wit'send. Political observers opine that Yeddyurappa has already become a formidable political force to reckon with.
After making his government comfortable in terms of numbers, he is seriously down to terra firma to keep the promise of development at its best. Thanks to 65-year-old, suave but hard taskmaster, Yeddyurappa, the redoubtable Chief Minister, the endangered garden city is turning a new leaf. With Yeddyurappa as helmsman, the state is in for a turnaround that augurs well for the city on a precipice. Roads, once the peerless city grandeur of the country, in recent past chock-a-block with immobilizing traffic, soon will become motorist friendly. The government is pressing the central government hard to make its so-called international airport worth its name so that it becomes commensurate with the vision of the city that BJP government, under the aegis of time-tested Yeddyurappa, has conjured up.
Going by his exemplary performance in the previous coalition government as Finance Minister, the state is on the path of a whale of a performance for the state when he is the Chief Minister himself. Now, after Narendra Modi and BC Khanduri, Yeddyurappa, architect of the first BJP electoral victory in South India, is a new avatar of development in the pantheon of nationalistic parivar. The way Shri Yeddyurappa has initiated engine of development, the BJP can pride itself upon in times to come. We can say that Yeddyurappa is yet another feather in development cap of BJP.
It has been barely 100 days since he took the reigns of power in the state but he has shown his resolve to cleanse the Augean stable that Karnataka would have become very soon. Even the coveted city of India, once the Indian Silicon Valley, Bengaluru, was losing its hard-earned repute. Shri Yeddyurappa, the dynamic CM, has made it loud and clear that his first task is to rescue Bengaluru from urban distress. BS Yeddyurappa himself is the head of the Bangalore Infrastructure Development Task Force. Work on the fourth stage of Cauvery Water Supply to Bangalore project will begin in December and will be completed in two years.
Known for his yeoman service to farmers by alleviating agrarian distress in terms of the softest loan ever to them, Yeddyurappa'swords carry the weight of a conviction. The speed with which Yeddyurappa has taken up the turnaround mission speaks volume about his sincerity towards proving his credo.
Three months is not enough to meet the challenges the Karnataka is beset with but Yeddyurappa'sintentions are crystal clear. He will leave no stone unturned to establish his credo as a development man. An example will suffice. When he was on a week-long tour to US to woo foreign investors, he promised galore to them in terms of infrastructures and other facilities. He was not carried away by the red carpet, and made a pitch for villages that shows his inclination for all-inclusive growth. He appealed to Kannadigas there to come to the state and adopt villages for their amelioration.
There is no doubt that the uppermost on his mind is the development and there are a lot of plans up his sleeves, which will unfold themselves at the start of the next year. A special package to woo foreign investments will be made ahead of the Global Investors? Meet in January 2009.
Take a look at the blueprint. To speed up industrialisation, a ?Vision Group? has been set up. A new industrial policy is being formulated to make it more investor friendly. Focus is on inclusive growth. Mark Yeddyurappa'swords?the vision of our government is to put Karnataka on the top of the developed states of the country and make it a model. The blueprint for realising the full potential of the state for development was being worked out in the form of a vision document ?Karnataka 2020? by a team set up for the purpose. Exclusive zones for food processing, IT, automobile and readymade garments would also be developed benefiting the districts which are strong in these sectors. It was proposed to identify 5,000 to 10,000 acres in the districts based on the resources available for the industrial zones.
Yedyurappa'stask is cut out for him?to make Karnataka an ideal place not only to live but also for investment. The State High-Level Clearance Committee of Industries in Karnataka in the month of August approved 25 projects with an investment of Rs. 30,000 crore, which is expected to provide employment to over 2.5 lakh people over the next three years. Prominent among the projects are two iron and steel plants and two cement units, one unit each in sugar, power, engineering, integrated townships, bio-fuel and petroleum sectors. Two special economic zones, two tourism projects, three port development proposals at Honnavar, Karwar and Malpe, and a few other small ventures were approved by the committee. The list is long.
Two super-specialty hospitals are in the pipeline that will serve as lifeline for Devanahalli taluk, one by Dr. Devi Shetty of Narayana Hrudayalaya on a 25-acre plot at a cost of Rs. 1,000 crore, and the other by Satya Sai Hospital of AS Hegde in Bangalore North taluk, on a 25-acre plot by investing Rs. 430 crore. They would treat 10 to 15 per cent of the patients at subsidised rates.
Shri Yeddyurappa wants to make his performance as engine to spread the wings of Bharatiya Janata Party to more green pastures south of Vindhyas. If he delivers, that is sure enough he will do, what he has promised, it will serve as a model for the people of other southern states to jump on the bandwagon of BJP. Yeddyurappa'sdevelopment initiatives in such a short stint may prove to be a boon for the BJP in the coming parliamentary elections. BJP will go to the state, saying BJP is the only party in the country, which knows how to govern and how to develop. Karnataka is BJP'sdebut and Yeddyurappa is gung ho into proving his credo as a development man.
(The writer can be contacted at deepakjourno@yahoo.com)
Leave a Comment