In poll-bound Karnataka, Modi blames “vote-bank” politics for North Karnataka’s backwardness

Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Thursday blamed the “vote-bank” politics of previous governments for parts of Karnataka remaining backward in an attack targeted at the rival Congress as the southern state gears up to face assembly polls in about four months.

Even though the region had the capability, the past governments had absolved themselves just by declaring Yadgir and neighbouring districts as backward, the PM said after opening a modernised irrigation canal and launching work on a portion of the Surat-Chennai expressway and village drinking water projects in Yadgir.

Kalaburagi and Yadagir are part of the seven backward districts that form the Kalyana Karnataka (Hyderabad-Karnataka) region. Vote-bank politics of the parties in power, Modi said, denied the region basic needs including electricity, roads, and water. His regime’s focus had only been development and not vote-bank politics.


“Even if one district in the country lags on the parameters of development, the country cannot become developed”, the PM said, and added it was the present government that addressed the most backward regions on priority and kicked off the hundred aspirational villages campaign.

The PM, who also addressed public later in Gulbarga district after launching distribution of title-deeds (hakku patras) to 50,000 plus families of Banjaras (SC) community, said when the Jal Jeevan mission began three and a half years ago, only three out of 18 crore rural families had piped water connection. “Today that number has gone up to 11 crores.”

FARMER & ENTREPRENEUR
The PM said he believed one could say India was developed only when there was improvement in the life of farmers and entrepreneurs. The country would develop only when there was good crop and expansion in factory output.

Modi often referred to the regimes at the Centre and in Karnataka as a “double-engine” government, as both are ruled by the BJP. “The focus of the double engine government on infrastructure and reforms is turning Karnataka into an investors' choice.” The FDI

inflows will increase as there is enthusiasm all over the world to invest in India, he said.

At Kalaburagi district, he heaped praise on the Banjara community and said steps to recognise their settlements were recommended way back in 1993, but the vote-bank politics delayed their implementation. “But now that indifferent atmosphere has changed.”

Even decades after the Independence, fruits of development had not reached a large section of the population. But Dalits, backward classes, tribals, divyang, children, and women were getting the government benefits now. “We are working with a clear strategy for empowering the people,” the PM said.

Modi also praised farmers of North Karnataka for making the region a pulse bowl which, he added, had helped India rely less on overseas supplies. The government’s pulse procurement under the minimum support price (MSP) had grown several fold and pulse growers had got Rs 60,000 crore in the past eight years compared to a few hundred crores before 2014, he said.

The UN had declared the year 2023 as the International Year of Millets, the PM said, mentioning coarse cereals like jowar and ragi are produced in abundance in Karnataka. The double-engine government was committed to increasing production of this nutritious coarse grain and promoting it worldwide, he said, hoping that the state’s farmers would play a leading role in taking this initiative forward.