Thiruvananthapuram, Jun 27 (PTI) The Congress-led UDF on Thursday slammed the ruling Left government for allegedly not granting funds timely to local bodies in the state for development activities.
The accusation by the opposition was made in a motion by UDF MLAs, including T Siddique, seeking adjournment of the House to discuss the problems being faced by local bodies due to lack of funds.
The allegations by the UDF on the issue were denied by state Minister for Local Self Government Department M B Rajesh, who said that the Centre and its financial restrictions on Kerala were responsible for the local bodies’ problems.
He said that the opposition was deliberately ignoring the Centre’s role in the issue due to the UDF’s narrow-minded politics.
The minister said the state government was doing the needful to ensure the local bodies get funds on time and rejected the opposition demand for adjoining the House.
In view of the explanation given by the minister, Speaker A N Shamseer denied permission for the notice to adjourn the House.
Following the denial of permission for the motion, Leader of Opposition in the Assembly V D Satheesan said that decentralisation has failed in Kerala and regional development has been adversely affected due to the financial mismanagement of the Left government.
Satheesan also contended that the state government’s claims of over Rs 57,000 crore being due from the Centre were based on falsehoods and incorrect figures.
“We will not support your (Left) claims based on falsehoods and wrong figures. Find somebody else for that. You are trying to mislead the public through such false claims. We will only support your actual correct demands for funds from the Centre,” he said.
Satheesan also alleged that just like the Narendra Modi government has no plan, the Left administration in Kerala too had no plans for expenditure and therefore, it had no priorities.
“Your (Left government) financial mismanagement is choking and drowning the local bodies,” he alleged.
The opposition leader said that in protest against the state government’s stand of creating hurdles in regional development and “drowning” the local bodies, he and his party colleagues were staging a walkout. Similarly, other UDF allies also staged a walkout.
Earlier, during discussions, Siddique alleged that the state government was not clearing the bills of the local bodies and not providing them with funds on time for development activities.
Denying his allegations, Rajesh said the opposition’s accusations were based on half truths, were baseless and did not take into consideration the steps taken by the government.
He said that the Centre not only cut short various funds and allocations to the state government, but several local bodies were also denied various grants without any reason. “Therefore, there is no reason to adjourn the House to discuss the issue. The state is doing the needful,” the minister said. PTI HMP HMP KH
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