Pradesh Congress Committee president Prasad Harichandan on Sunday came down heavily on the Naveen Patnaik Government for ‘failing’ on all fronts and ‘compounding’ miseries of poor people in the State.
“The BJD Government has failed on all fronts. It has been unable to resolve basic problems of the people even after 17 years of its rule. People have started feeling that Naveen Patnaik has betrayed them,” Harichandan told a Press conference here in the wake of completion of three years of the fourth term of the BJD Government.
Reading out statistics on poor performance of the Government, Harichandan said only two per cent of the population have access to safe drinking water.
He said existing health facilities are grossly inadequate to meet needs of the State and lack of doctors adds to the problem.
“Odisha is the third highest in infant mortality rate with 53 deaths per 1,000. Odisha’s death rate stands at 8.5 against the then national average of 7,” he lamented adding that Dana Majhi incident showed weakness in health services. He said unhygienic conditions in Government hospitals are alarming.
Speaking on education sector, Harichandan said there are 24,446 teacher posts lying vacant under the Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan (SSA) and about 95 per cent of primary schools do not have teachers for each class. What is more galling is that 18 per cent of regular teachers and 26 per cent of contractual teachers are not trained, he said.
The State Government also could not properly deal with the drought situation forcing farmers to commit suicide, he alleged further.
“Miseries of poor people, farmers and backward sections have been compounded because of the State Government’s inefficiency. The Naveen Government wants people to remain poor, uneducated and dependent on the Government for the BJD’s benefit,” he alleged.