Belthangady: Union Minister for Rural Development Jairam Ramesh, on Friday inaugurated the tri-decennial celebrations of Sri Kshetra Dharmasthala Rural Development Project, at a function held at the Amritavarshini Auditorium at Dharmasthala.

In his address, Ramesh said  the Project was a model to the entire nation and should be implemented in various parts of the nation. On this occasion, the minister distributed  dividend of Rs 6.5 crore to a total of 4000 Pragathi Bandhu beneficiaries in Belthangady taluk.

The Minister said as an ardent devotee of Lord Manjunatha he  strongly feels the need for an agreement between the Union Finance Ministry, Rural Development Ministry and Sri Kshetra Dharmasthala to entrust  the supervision of the 527 self employment training centres in the nation to Dr Heggade of Dharmasthala.

He was also all praise for the various activities under the Project that aimed at empowering rural people.

State Minister for Rural Development Jagadish Shettar released a booklet on Rural Development. Presiding over the function, Dr D Veerendra Heggade, Dharmadhikari of Dharmasthala said the project would be extended to the state level in the days to come.

He said the self employment training centres are being supervised under his leadership through a monitoring cell and added there was no direct supervision.

Nalin Kumar Kateel, Jayaprakash Hegde, MPs,. Abhayachandra Jain, MLC, ZP Chief Shailaja Bhat, Dhanalakshmi Janardhan, Vice President, TP Chief Mamatha Shetty, Hemavathi Heggade, Dr LH Manjunath, Exectuvie Director of SKDRDP and others were present on the occasion.