Bhubaneswar: Slamming the BJD government for putting the state under a debt trap, Opposition BJP and Congress MLAs demanded Tuesday the publication of a white paper on the economic condition in Odisha. Participating in a debate in the House, the Opposition members claimed that the loan burden of the state as well as the per capita loan burden has increased significantly.
The state loan burden has increased to Rs 1.12 lakh crore now from Rs 18,900 crore in 1999-2,000. Similarly, the per capita loan burden also rose from Rs 6,902 in 2000 to Rs 22,042, said BJP chief whip Mohan Majhi.
The government has no plan to increase its own revenue and depends upon loans. There is no road to villages, no drinking water, industrial units were closed and the youths are migrating to other states in search of jobs due to fiscal mismanagement, Majhi pointed out.
Participating in the debate, Congress MLA Santosh Singh Saluja said the people in Odisha are getting poorer as the government could not earmark the required money for development. The government has also miserably failed to spend 70 per cent of the allocated money, alleged Saluja.
Similarly, Congress MLA Tara Prasad Bahinipati said the loan burden of the state has increased by 375 per cent during the last 10 years. He said over two lakh posts are lying vacant and the government has not given appointments during the last 20 years.
All factories and industrial units are either sold or closed and the youths of Odisha are migrating to other states in search of jobs. Describing the government as totally inefficient, Bahinipati demanded for publication of a white paper on the economic condition of Odisha.
Replying to the debate, Finance Minister Niranjan Pujari refuted the allegations made by the Opposition and said Odisha is a leading state in the country in fiscal management and is in a much better position in comparison to all other states of India.
Pujari pointed out that except for Bihar the loan burden of the state is the second lowest in India. Dissatisfied with the minister’s reply the BJP and the Congress members staged a noisy walkout from the Assembly.