Austerity seems to be the last thing on the minds of BJP bigwigs as they battle a crisis to save the Sadananda Gowda government. Even the severe drought have not deterred the government from going on a spending spree by purchasing 20 Toyota Innova cars, each costing over Rs 18 lakh.
Interestingly, the government has already provided Rs 8 lakh interest free loans to all legislators to purchase their own vehicles. Instead, the fleet of vehicles parked at Legislators’ Home (LH) is being used by supporters of the MLAs and MLCs. Worse, the government has amended the rule that these vehicles should be used within Bengaluru and has allowed them to be taken anywhere in the state. This has resulted in the vehicles now being used to meet the needs of legislators’ supporters and for their family trips, sources in LH said.
The Legislative Assembly already has over 70 cars. The idea of buying the cars was mooted as it was felt the legislators could not afford the cars. Around 20 cars were kept for the use of MLAs at LH which they could hire for nominal rates. After the BJP came to power in 2008, the government decided to extend interest free loans of Rs 8 lakh to all legislators for purchasing vehicles. Almost all the legislators availed the loan and purchased vehicles. The loan instalments were being paid from their salary. By this time, the legislators’ car fleet had expanded to 70 cars. Instead of reducing the fleet size, the governments decided to increase it further and purchased 20 cars besides recruiting drivers for the additional cars.
While the cost of hiring an Ambassador car at the LH is Rs 6 per km, an Innova car comes at Rs 10 per km which is still way below the cost of hiring a taxi from outside. Annually, each car incurs six times more expenditure than what it earns from trips. Most legislators do not stop their supporters from misusing the facility, sources said. When contacted, Legislative Assembly Speaker K.G. Bopaiah admitted that they had purchased 20 more Innova cars for the use of legislators. “It is true that we have given them interest free loans to purchase cars. But if they travel to Bengaluru by bus, we have to provide them travel facilities, so we have kept the cars ready for them,’’ he said.
When asked about the ‘misuse’ of the vehicles for private purposes, the Speaker said he too had received such complaints. “It is up to legislators to ensure that the facilities extended to them are not misused. We cannot interfere in their affairs,’’ he added.