Bhubaneswar: In the face of Congress’ worst electoral defeat in a decade in Odisha, the party on Wednesday alleged that the governor’s inaugural speech in the State Assembly was discouraging.
Leader of Opposition Narasingha Mishra said, “It is unfortunate that the governor didn’t mention anything about the law and order situation during the recently concluded Panchayat polls in the State. Also he didn’t utter a single word how the ruling BJD used the government machinery during the polls for the benefit of the party.”
“The most unfortunate thing is that in his address to the House the governor didn’t talk about the poor farmers of Odisha who toil hard to feed us throughout the year,” Mishra noted.
The treasury bench rejected the allegations.
“The achievements of Odisha government have been pointed out by the governor. Our government is concerned about the development of the State and we will continue to do so in the future,” BJD spokesperson Sashibhusan Behera said.
During his speech governor SC Jamir stressed that the state has achieved significant improvement in finance through various fiscal reforms, and the effort in achieving debt sustainability from a position of debt stress was significant. The Gross State Domestic Product (GSDP) ratio had been brought down to 15.7 per cent in 2015-16 from 50.7 per cent in 2002-03, he stated.
A notification issued by the Assembly secretariat said the budget session of Odisha Assembly will continue till April 7 in two phases. While discussion on budget to be held between February 23 and 25, State finance minister Pradip Amat will present the budget for financial year 2017-18 on February 27.
The first phase session will continue till March 4. The second phase will begin from March 14 and continue till April 7, the notification said.