BANGALORE: Chief Minister D V Sadananda Gowda has emphasised that the approach to the 12th Plan should necessarily have relevant strategy to contain spiralling inflation.“I am compelled to state that price rise of essential commodities and fuels is continuing unabated and causing serious hardship to a large section of society,” Sadananda Gowda said, while addressing the 56th meeting of the National Development Council at New Delhi on Saturday.Pitching for more allocation of power from the central grid, the Karnataka Chief Minister rued that the state has not been able to achieve progress for want of environmental clearances and coal linkages from the Centre. “Karnataka has proposed to add 8,290 MW of power in the 12th Five Year Plan and we need Centre’s assistance,” Sadananda Gowda added.Pointing to wide difference in the number of BPL families identified by the Planning Commission and by the respective states, the Chief Minister said there is a need to revise the parameters for identifying the BPL families to bring in uniformity.Highlighting problems being faced by silk growers, Gowda said the reduction in the customs duty of raw silk from 30 per cent to 5 per cent in the Budget had led to steep crash in the cocoon prices resulting in distress sale.“Silk import duty needs to be immediately increased in order to protect 11 lakh persons including sericulturists who are dependent on silk industry for their livelihood,” the Chief Minister added.He urged the Union government to include Upper Bhadra Project under national projects and appealed to the Centre to release Rs 2,000 crore to the state to tackle water quality problems on account of excess fluoride and arsenic in drinking water for about 8,079 habitations.
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