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CM solves villagers' woes via video conference DH News Service BANGALORE, Jan 14 Making an attempt to narrow the digital divide, Chief Minister S M Krishna today interacted with the people of a village in Bellary district through a video-conference and took some on-the-spot decisions to redress their grievances. The new programme, called 'Janaspandana', is one of the methods adopted by Mr Krishna to reach out to the people in remote corners of the State using information technology. He is planning to hold such video-conferences every week. He will also continue his 'Janata Darshan' programme at his home office in Bangalore. The villagers of Genikihal, located 43 km away from the district headquarters of Bellary, interacted with Mr Krishna for an hour and aired their grievances, demands and suggestions. The village falls under the Kurugodu Assembly constituency, represented by the KPCC President, Mr Allum Veerabhadrappa. Mr Krishna was assisted at his office here by top IAS officers, ministers hailing from Bellary district M Y Ghorpade and Diwakar Babu, MLC K C Kondaiah and MP Kolur Basavanagouda. Mr Veerabhadrappa monitored the arrangements at Genikihal. However, the questions raised by the villagers, who were mostly village panchayat members, seemed to be tutored and Mr Krishna had ready reply for many of them. Surprisingly, there were not any complaints against shortage of power supply or drinking water, though Bellary is facing a severe drought this year. One of the spot decisions taken by Mr Krishna was to appoint a special tahsildar for Kurugodu to look into the local needs. However, he turned down the request for according taluk status to Kurugodu saying that the delimitation of Assembly and Parliament constituencies had begun. Reacting to a demand by farmers to waive collection of interest on crop loans taken from national banks, Mr Krishna said the government had already waived interest on loans given by co-operative societies. The members of self-help groups constituted under the Stree Shakti programme vociferously demanded that the government should release subsidy for the groups. Mr Krishna said the officials concerned would be directed to look into the matter. He also directed officials to consider the request by an anganwadi worker to sanction houses for anganwadi workers under Ashraya scheme. On sanctioning funds for the long-pending Kolur lift irrigation project which would irrigate 2,000 acres in the village, Mr Krishna said the government would sanction funds provided farmers formed water users' co-operative societies and also paid electricity charges. During the programme, two girls studying in a government school urged Mr Krishna to provide computer education facilities in their school. Reciprocating the enthusiasm shown by the students, Mr Krishna said the students would be attached to a computer centre in a neighbouring school. After the programme, Mr Krishna told reporters that a mechanism had been worked out to ensure that the directions issued during such video-conferences were effectively followed up and implemented.
