Hitting hard on the work culture and inabilities of the Congress-JMM-RJD coalition Government in the past 100 days, leader of Opposition Arjun Munda on Thursday said that the Government has been encouraging mafia raj in the State by letting outsiders cashing in on the resource. Munda said that he would write to the government reminding them of the duties and responsibilities towards the people of the State.
Counting failures of the government on various parameters, Munda said that the law and order situation of the State was at its lowest ebb. “Big incidents of loot, murder, rape have become common as the criminals are fearlessly roaming in the capital city. And, this is happening because the government, rather than focusing on improving law and order, is using top officials for dubious reasons. We have heard that there is policy in coal belts to ferry illegal coal for three days in a week. If this is true, the concerned officials must be getting patronage. This becomes a source of illegal income,” said Munda while addressing a press meet on the completion of 100 days of the Hemant government.
On the development front also there was no agenda of the government, said the Opposition leader. “Even before the Raghuram Rajan Committee’s formation we had raised the demands of special status for the state on many forums. I had written to the Prime Minister about the issue and had raised the demand in the NDC meetings in 2011 and 2012. Now when the Rajan Committee report is out the CM once talked about special status but he again fell silent under the pressure of Congress,” he affirmed.
“The incumbent government was afraid of carrying on good schemes that were started by the previous government. We had a target of skill development of five lakh youth in the Youth and Skill Development year announced. But there is no progress on that front. There were lots of other public welfare schemes that did not take of during the past 100 days,” Munda added.
The former CM also said that there was absolutely no consensus among coalition partners in matters of public interest. “The cabinet has a collective responsibility to the assembly and the people of the state. If someone gives political statements it is all right. But, there is a huge difference of opinions even in executive matters among the cabinet members.
Moreover, the cabinet meetings are also not taking place regularly in the stipulated period of time,” Munda said elaborating that the cabinet should meet at least once in 10 days even if there was no specific agenda to discuss.
Commenting on the Baaalu Ghat issue the leader said that it was very unfortunate that constitutional rights of the Panchayati Raj Institutions (PRI) were put aside and people from outside the state were coming to cash in on the resources.
“Panchayats were the local bodies that needed to be benefitted by the resources. The decision to make these ghats free was wrong. Earlier mafia entered in the process indirectly and now we can see the worse results,” he said.
Commenting on the recent statements of a Minister on disqualifying teaching examination aspirants on the basis of language Munda said that when people were not able to do something on the development front they wanted to take political mileage through such political statements. “They should rather bring a proposal on the matter and discuss it at the right forum rather than giving statements in public,” he said.
Munda said that he was criticising the government not because he was playing the role of Opposition leader but it was for the good of the people of the State. “I will write to the government requesting it not to kill the development prospects of the state. The State should not be victimised for any reason. The government should be accountable to the people of the State,” he said.