Mangaluru : Congress began its campaign against MP Nalin Kumar Kateel Keeping next year’s Lok Sabha elections in mind,  claiming that he has not done anything for the development of Dakshina Kannada, said Sanjeeva Matandoor, MLA from Puttur and president of Dakshina Kannada unit of the BJP, on Monday, August 6th.

Speaking to the media at BJP office Mangaluru he said,  MP released funds to the tune of Rs.15,145 crore to Dakshina Kannada from the Union government from 2014-15 to till date (during 2018-19). However, Congress is unable to tolerate the development works taken up by the MP and has resorted to negative campaigning.

Mr. Matandoor spoke about the Congress activists holding a protest in the city recently against the delay in completing flyover work at Pumpwell and Thokkottu on the National Highway 66 and said that the design issues delayed the commencement of the work initially. Though the Union government invited bids on March 9, 2010 for building the flyovers, due to intervention from the district administration and the Mangaluru City Corporation, it took three years for finalising the design of the flyover at Pumpwell. Hence, work commenced only in 2013. Later, the contractor Navayuga Udupi Tollyway Pvt. Ltd, delayed the work. The MP has held several meetings with the company tp get the work done at the earliest and

Speaking about the work done by the MP for the district, the MLA said that in the last four years, two industrial incubation centres have been opened in the district. Also, 15 tinkering laboratories and 15 Jan Aushadhi shops have been opened. Proposals have been sent to construct by-pass roads at Sullia and Belthangady-Ujire and the detailed project reports were now being prepared.

Rs. 20 crore has been released to Mangalore University under the Rashtriya Uchchatar Shiksha Abhiyan and Rs. 14 crore has been released to seven government first grade colleges in the district under the abhiyan. Additionally, 105 telecom towers of BSNL have been built in the district for mobile phone connectivity. Cooking gas connections have been given to 12,792 persons under the Pradhan Mantri Ujjwala Yojana, he said.

MLA, Dr Bharat Shetty, leaders, Pratap Simha Nayak, Ravishankar Mijar, Kishore Rai, Jitendra Kottary and others were present.