Siddaramaiah meets Modi, seeks Centre’s support for Bengaluru citing its global status

Chief Minister Siddaramaiah met Prime Minister Narendra Modi in Delhi on Friday and sought special assistance to upgrade Bengaluru’s infrastructure in view of the city’s emergence as an important global city in tech and innovation. He also requested a special grant of Rs 6000 for the proposed peripheral ring road (PRR) in Bengaluru.

Bengaluru, Siddaramaiah said, was among the top three contributors to the country’s GDP, while adding that his government has major plans to improve infrastructure, de-congest and upgrade the living standards for residents in the city. The CM handed a formal letter of request to the PM and urged him to ask the Urban Development, Railway and Road Transport ministries to back the state’s projects.

The CM highlighted the need to lift the profile of 13 tier two cities. While the state government has set aside Rs 2000 crore for the next three years, this was inadequate to meet the infrastructure of these cities. He sought Rs 10,000 crore assistance from the Centre for investing in these cities.


Siddaramaiah sought the PM’s intervention with the Finance Ministry to increase the Nabard assistance to the state’s cooperative banking sector. The Nabard has cut the short-term agriculture credit from Rs 5600 crore, last year to Rs 2340 crore. This drastic cut will hurt the cost of finance to farmers unless the state stepped in to give an interest subsidy, but that would seriously imperil the state’s finances, the CM said.

The CM highlighted the “raw deal” Karnataka is receiving at the hands of the 15^th Finance Commission. The state’s share in the divisible pool of taxes has gone down 1%, he said, while adding that the Finance Ministry had the opportunity to compensate with special grants. Since this had not been done, the CM requested the PM’s intervention to ask the FM to back Karnataka with additional grants. He appealed to the PM to ensure the 16^th Finance Commission too did not end up punishing the states that contribute a large share to the central tax pool with sharp cuts in devolution.