State budget on February 8

Amid the threats from BS Yeddyurappa to topple the government before the presentation of the budget, the ruling BJP has decided that chief minister Jagdish Shettar would present the State budget for 2013-14 on February 8

The Cabinet meeting held on Saturday decided to recommend to the governor to convene the assembly session from February 4 to 11. Briefing reporters on the Cabinet meeting at Vidhana Soudha, law minister Suresh Kumar said the governor will address the joint session at Vidhana Soudha on Feb 4.

Yeddyurappa, who has left the BJP to launch his Karnataka Janata Party (KJP), has vowed that he would not allow the presentation of budget by Shettar to prevent what he perceives to be the BJP government's attempt to hijack his populist schemes, in the run-up to the elections four months away.

Yeddyurappa has been planning to make his populist schemes such as the Bhagyalakshmi bonds, Sandhya Suraksha scheme and free bicycles for girl students of high schools, as the main plank of his election campaign.

However, the ruling BJP vowed to ensure that Yeddyurappa does not get any mileage out of the schemes and decided to present more attractive schemes in the budget that can overshadow programmes for which Yeddyurappa may take credit, according to sources in the BJP.

The sources further claim that the realisation that such schemes may on the anvil had made Yeddyurappa desperate enough to pull down the government, which incidentally his followers have been opposing.

Usually, the governor addresses the first session of the year and the budget session is convened subsequently in order to allow time between the two sessions during which the State government could incorporate in the budget some suggestions made by the governor.

But as the election procedure will start in March, the joint session and budget session are being held with just a short gap.