Former Karnataka Chief Minister Basavaraj Bommai on Wednesday warned the state government that the Bhartiya Janta Party (BJP) will lock the offices of the Electricity Supply Companies (ESCOM) across the state if farmers are not provided continuous power supply for seven hours in three phases.
Bommai attacked the state government and said that the duty of the government was to ensure the power supply and it was not doing any favour. He was addressing a farmers' protest organised by the BJP against the 'anti-farmer attitude' of the government.
"The officials would tell how the Department of Energy had been functioning. The previous BJP government had given Rs 10,000 crore to the Energy Department. However, the present Congress government has not released any grant as it did not have money to release the grant and purchase coal," Bommai said.
There are 1.50 lakh IP (irrigation pump) sets and all the crops are drying in Chikkaballapura district for want of power, he added. He said the previous BJP government had released the grants to the MLAs of the then-opposition parties, and treated everyone equally. "This is a zero-grant government as the money is not released for any development works," Bommai said, calling it anti-farmer, as the IP sets of scores of farmers have stopped functioning for want of power.
(With inputs from PTI)
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