On Congress' "5 Guarantees" Announcements, B Bommai's "Disappointed" Remark

Hitting out at the decisions of the Congress government during the first Cabinet meeting, former Karnataka Chief Minister Basavaraj Bommai on Saturday said that there is a huge difference between the ruling party's announcements and poll promises.

"There is a lot of difference in the promises made by the Congress government and the announcements made by Chief Minister Siddaramaiah after the first Cabinet. People had expected a lot of announcements and immediate implementation. Some of the women started travelling free in the buses. Today's announcements have disappointed the people," Mr Bommai told ANI after addressing a press briefing here.

Earlier in the day, the newly elected Karnataka Chief Minister Siddaramaiah said that the first Cabinet meeting has issued orders for the implementation of five guarantees which were promised by the party before the elections.

The five 'main' guarantees are 200 units of free power to all households (Gruha Jyoti); Rs 2,000 monthly assistance to the woman head of every family (Gruha Lakshmi); 10 kg of rice free to every member of a BPL household (Anna Bhagya); Rs 3,000 every month for unemployed graduate youth and Rs 1,500 for unemployed diploma holders (both in the age group of 18-25) for two years (Yuva Nidhi) and free travel for women in public transport buses (Uchita Prayana).

Addressing a press briefing after the first Cabinet meeting in Vidhan Soudha, here, Karnataka Chief Minister Siddaramaiah said, "Five guarantees in the manifesto were promised and the order for the implementation of those five guarantees was given after the first cabinet meeting. All will be in force after the next cabinet meeting which will be called within a week."

The Karnataka Legislative Assembly session is to be held on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday, next week.

Also, hours after swearing-in as Chief Minister, Siddaramaiah lashed out at the previous Bharatiya Janata Party government saying that the government ruling before was useless.

"Government which was ruling earlier was useless. They couldn't get us the share of taxes properly. The Centre has to give us Rs 5,495 crores as per the finance commission recommendation."

Earlier in the day, as many as eight Congress MLAs were sworn in as ministers in the Karnataka Cabinet during the oath-taking ceremony in Bengaluru.

Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge's son Priyank Kharge, party's MLAs G Parameshwara and MB Patil were among the eight MLAs.

The other MLAs who took oath included KH Muniyappa, KJ George, Satish Jarkiholi, Ramalinga Reddy and BZ Zameer Ahmed Khan.

Top brass of the Congress party including the Gandhi family members Rahul Gandhi and Priyanka Gandhi, party's national president Mallikarjun Kharge were present on the occasion.

The Chief Ministers of the Congress-ruled states including Himachal Chief Minister Sukhvinder Singh Sukhu, Rajasthan Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot, and Chhattisgarh Chief Minister Bhupesh Baghel attended the event.

Congress bagged 135 seats in the May 10 elections to the 224-member Karnataka Assembly ousting the ruling BJP, which got 66 seats while the Janata Dal (Secular) secured 19 seats in the results declared on May 13.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)