Pradesh Congress Committee president Jayadev Jena on Sunday kicked off civic body poll campaigning for his party at Jajpur Town.
He attacked Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik for not spending Rs 13,000 crore of Central grants in a proper way which the Union Government granted in the last five years to the State under the MNREGA. “Odisha is the country’s only State which is facing a CBI probe into massive misutilisation of the money granted under the MNREGA,” said Jena.
He also alleged that Naveen Patnaik is an anti-tribal leader, for which he tried to forcibly acquire land of Niyamagiri hillock tribals to hand it over to the Vedanta company for bauxite mining. The tribals in all the 12 Palli Sabhas recently gave their verdict against this move.
The Congress-led UPA Government has been providing huge grants to Odisha, but the State Government has failed to utilise the funds in an effective manner. The State Government has also failed on numerous occasions to submit utilisation certificates for use of Central grants, Jena said.
The Centre has allocated Rs 5,000 crore to the State for construction of 12,000 km of rural roads since past three years, but the execution of the scheme is very poor, the State Congress chief said.
Jena said the BJD Government is embroiled in a mega mining scam. Many mine owners, in a clear nexus with the Chief Minister, looted Rs 4 lakh crore by doing illegal mining, he alleged.
The Congress meeting was also addressed by leader of Opposition in State Assembly Bhupinder Singh, other senior party leaders Sitakanta Mohapatra, Janmejay lenka and district president Srinath Mishra.