Karnataka spent Rs 97,813 crore on 'five guarantees': CM office

Bengaluru, Sep 8 (PTI) Karnataka government has so far spent Rs 97,813 crore on the 'five guarantees', the Chief Minister Siddaramaiah’s office said on Monday.

Siddaramaiah chaired a review meeting on the five guarantees on Monday.

Later, the Chief Minister’s office said in a statement, "Under the five Guarantee Schemes, an expenditure of Rs 97,813 crore has been incurred so far".

The five guarantee schemes are ‘Gruha Jyoti’ offering 200 units of free electricity to every household, ‘Gruha Lakshmi’ scheme promising Rs 2,000 to every woman head of a family and ‘Anna Bhagya’ offering 10 kg rice to every member of the BPL family a month.

The 'Yuva Nidhi’ promises Rs 3,000 dole to unemployed graduates and Rs 1,500 to unemployed diploma holders for two years (for those in the 18-25 age group) and ‘Shakti’ scheme permits free travel for Karnataka women in non-luxury government buses within the state.

The statement said that Rs 50,005 crore has been spent under the Gruha Lakshmi scheme, Rs 18,139 crore under the Gruha Jyoti scheme, Rs 623 crore under the Yuva Nidhi scheme, Rs 13,903 crore under the Shakti scheme, and Rs 11,821.17 crore under the Anna Bhagya scheme.

Chief minister directed officers to update the list of deceased beneficiaries every month at the Panchayat level and the information should be provided to the banks concerned.

He told them that the names of the deceased beneficiaries should be removed from the list, the statement added.

"Action must be taken at the Panchayat level for inclusion and deletion of beneficiaries," Siddaramaiah was quoted as saying.

Directions were given to take steps to resolve the confusion regarding whether GST return filers are eligible to receive benefits under the Gruha Lakshmi scheme, the statement said.

Chief minister instructed officers that ineligible BPL cardholders must be identified and their BPL cards should be cancelled at the Panchayat level. The standards related to this must be strictly enforced.

"Strict measures must be taken to prevent the sale of Anna Bhagya rice in the black market. There will be an examination of the possibility of distributing other region-specific food grains in place of rice," Siddaramaiah said. PTI

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