Karnataka Government Spends Crores On Committee Salaries Amid Revenue Crunch Controversy

Bengaluru: While struggling to mop up revenue to fund the five guarantee schemes it promised to the people during 2023 elections, the Karnataka government spending crores as salary to a committee set up to monitor its implementation has kicked up a row.

Though the government has been disbursing salary for the `Guarantee Implementation Monitoring Committee' office bearers and the employees working in the Committee office, the salary structure was revealed in a government reply during the ongoing budget session.

Interestingly, the committee is comprising of five Congress party leaders. While former MLA H M Revanna heads it as Chairman, the other members include another former minister S R Patil, sitting MLC Dinesh Gooligowda, Suraj Hegde, Pushpa Amarnath and S R Meharoz Khan are the Vice Presidents of the Committee. The salary structure of the six are above the pay scale of Karnataka Chief Secretary itself.

While the Chairman gets ₹ 5.90 lakh per month as salary, the Vice Presidents are paid on an average of ₹ 4.43 lakh. The salary payment to the office staff of the Committee comes up to ₹ 20.63 lakh. In total, salary alone for the office bearers and the employees of the committee is coming up to ₹55.33 lakh. The other perks for these six members and the office expenses are extra. In total, the Karnataka government has been spending ₹ 6.6 crore per year to manage this monitoring committee.

Taking a dig at the government, expelled BJP MLA Basannagouda Patil Yatnal has questioned the logic behind Chief Minister allocating funds for such wasteful exercises, while the legislators are pleading for some allotment for even basic needs of their respective constituencies.

``The Chief Minister boasts of presenting 17 budgets, but I don't see any wisdom in wasting public money on such wasteful expenditure, especially at distress times. The government should immediately dissolve the committee, which is set up to accommodate a few retired Congress leaders,'' Yatnal said.

Opposition leader R Ashok wondered how the government could fix the salary to the members of a committee, that was more than the salary of the Chief Secretary. ``While the Chief Secretary salary is around ₹ 2 lakh, the Committee office bearers' salary begins from ₹4.4 lakh,'' he lamented.

``This committee is just a rehabilitation center for a few Congress workers and it does not have either legal or administrative sanctity. This is an unscientific move, aimed at filling the pockets of a few Congress leaders. The government should immediately wind up the Committee,'' he added.

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While the Karnataka government is struggling to mop up revenue to implement the five guarantee schemes it promised to the people during the 2023 general elections, the salaries of the 'Guarantee implementation Committee has now raked up a controversy.

While the Committee Chairman is paid ₹ 5.9 lakh per month, the five Vice Presidents are drawing over ₹4.5 lakh each o'er month. The salary of staff is coming up to ₹ 22.5 lakh per month. In total, the committee salary itself is coming over ₹55 lakh per month.

Expelled BJP leader Basannagouda Patil Yatnal and Opposition leader R Ashok have questioned the logic behind constituting the committee comprising Congress workers and spending over ₹6.6 crore every year as their salary.