Chief minister Jitan Ram Manjhi waves on his way to the Assembly in Patna on Monday. Picture by Deepak Kumar

Patna, June 30: The budget for 2014-15, being passed in the current Assembly session, is a curse according to Leader of Opposition Nand Kishore Yadav.

“The person who approved the budget as a minister (read Nitish Kumar) lost his post. The man who wanted to be the finance minister and tabled the entire budget (Vijay Kumar Choudhary) was not made the finance minister. The person who was happy handling three portfolios (Bijendra Prasad Yadav) was made the finance minister and has to get this budget passed. Only god knows what will happen if this budget is passed,” said Nand Kishore, while initiating the general debate on the budget on Monday.

The budget has been presented in the House before the Lok Sabha polls and a vote on account for four months was already taken.

Nand Kishore delivered a hard-hitting speech questioning the JDU’s claims on governance. “The state government has made marginal or no increase in the allotment of areas like minority welfare, SC/ST welfare, sugarcane development, tourism and other departments, which the government has been claiming as its key areas. On the other hand, it has reduced the budget of departments like water resources, animal husbandry, food and consumer protection,” he said, stressing that the government’s budgetary allotment does not match its claims.

The Leader of the Opposition added that during the financial year 2013-14, the government had been unable to spend funds in several key departments such as science and technology, IT, tourism and water resources.

“This is not the government which was given the mandate to rule in 2010. This is the government born out of betrayal involved in the politics of survival rather than governance,” he said.

He asked the government why schemes such as giving agriculture inputs to farmers were stopped. He also slammed the government on account of law and order, rural roads and power.

Nand Kishore kicked up a storm in the House when he alleged that transfers of engineers were stopped despite chief minister Jitan Ram Manjhi’s approval. Manjhi stood to deny the charge.

The House also witnessed ruckus over implementation of the Food Security Act in Bihar. The Opposition alleged that the distribution of foodgrain to the below poverty line families had crumpled in the state, as the government had cancelled all ration cards and new cards have not been distributed.

BJP MLAs entered the Well of the House raising slogans against the government.

Incidentally, JDU MLA Majit Kumar Singh had put up a call attention on the same issue and Speaker Uday Narayan Choudhary suggested that the Opposition should participate in the question and answer of the call attention.

But the Opposition rejected the request and stressed that the police had to resort to lathicharge against the BPL families protesting against non-availability of subsidised foodgrain. The Food Security Act was implemented on February 1 in Bihar.