Rail Budget dissapointing for K'taka people: Kumaraswamy

Bangalore, Feb 26 (UNI) Karnataka Chief Minister H D Kumaraswamy today said the Rail Budget presented today may have emerged as pro-people in general, but it was disappointing for the people of Karnataka.

Projects to connect new destinations had not been up to expectations. ''Railway Minister Lalu Prasad has given indications of taking up the East-West corridor project, but ignored widening the North-South network and has promised to take up only survey of this sector,'' he said.

Mr Kumaraswamy said he was happy that four new trains would be running in the state and some lines would be converted to broad guage. However, many other projects, which had been put on the back burner, had been allocated only token funds and this had disappointed the people of the State.

He said he had earlier met Mr Prasad explaining him the need to take up some projects in the state on a priority basis, but the Minister had not responded positively to his requests. However, scaling up the State's allocation in the Railway budget from Rs 240 crore to Rs 467.81 crore should be appreciated, he added.

Meanwhile, the Karnataka Small Scale Industries Association, in a release here, hailed the Railway budget as ''dynamic'', which had touched all aspects of railways like freight, comfort and tariff. It welcomed the four per cent reduction in sleeper class fares, introduction of three-tier freight containers, the focus on cleanliness and 73 per cent of capacity utilisation.

UNI