Haryana govt's motto seems to be 'look busy, do nothing': Hooda

Senior Congress leader Bhupinder Singh Hooda on Wednesday hit out at Haryana's ruling BJP-JJP coalition, saying there are burning issues facing the state but it seems that the government's motto is "look busy, do nothing".

He said during its first 100 days in office, the government has only made speeches and failed to deliver on the governance front.

The Bharatiya Janata Party-Jannayak Janta Party government completed 100 days in office last week.

"Many schools don't have enough teachers, but they (government) are taking no steps to fill up the vacancies for 40,000 teachers. There are other burning issues facing other sections of the society, including farmers, but this government is doing nothing. Their only motto seems to be 'look busy, do nothing'," Hooda said at a press conference here.

"They may claim they have done 101 works during their first 100 days in office, the truth is that all they have done is make speeches with nothing on the governance front. We had highlighted mining and paddy scams, but no probe has been ordered so far," he said.

The former Haryana chief minister also claimed that at over 28 per cent, Haryana has the highest unemployment rate in the country and rural consumption is down.

Hooda questioned the logic behind the state government's pre-budget consultation exercise in the absence of the economic survey report and said it will be difficult to give concrete suggestions.

"In the absence of the economic survey report, how will we know what the state's economic situation is," he said.

After holding discussions with various stakeholders, including industrialists, Haryana Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar will hold a pre-budget meeting with legislators from February 17 to 19 to deliberate on sectoral allocations.

Hooda said he will attend the meeting.

The Congress leader claimed that Haryana's debt has increased three-fold from Rs 61,000 crore to Rs 1.81 lakh crore under the BJP regime and demanded a white paper on state's economic situation.

"The debt has gone up despite the fact that development works came to a standstill during their (BJP) regime. Power plants, metro rail lines, new railway lines, industrial model townships, mega projects, new universities, and acquisition of land for development works, all this development took place during our time.

"What have they done? Let them name a single project they started. The only thing in which they are going ahead like a bullet train is corruption despite their tall claims of zero tolerance towards corruption," he said.

On the Sutlej-Yamuna Link (SYL) canal issue, Hooda said the Punjab government recently convened an all-party meeting and is openly claiming that it does not have a drop to spare, but the Haryana dispensation is doing nothing to counter it.

"The Supreme Court has already ruled in Haryana's favour, only the execution part of it remains. But the BJP-led government in the state and at the Centre is doing nothing to ensure that the canal construction is taken up at the earliest," he alleged.

"If they want our support on the SYL issue, I am ready to stand shoulder-to-shoulder with them. Where Haryana's interest is concerned, I will firmly stand with them, but I will oppose them wherever the state's interest is compromised," he said.

Asked to comment on the Congress' rout in the Delhi Assembly polls, Hooda said, "In a democracy, you have to respect the people's mandate."

"As far as the performance of the Congress in the Delhi polls is concerned, there should be introspection in the party at the national level," he said.

Replying to a related question, Hooda said, "The country needs the Congress. Congress is for the country, Congress has fought for the freedom of the country. It is the moral duty of Congress to fight for the country."