Bengaluru: Raising his voice against Chief Minister, Siddaramaiah’s ambitious project — Caste census — Housing minister M.H. Ambareesh on Tuesday asserted that the ongoing census has failed to gather information about homeless in the state.
Speaking to reporters after meeting party workers at the Karnataka Pradesh Congress Committee office here, Mr Ambareesh said, “Several officers have complained to me that they are not able to gather information related to caste and other important issues. Whenever they (enumerators) ask questions related to caste, many house owners have asked them to leave their premises.”
According to him, enumerators were being humiliated, as a result they were not gathering accurate information. “I personally feel that for any government to carry out its welfare schemes, the government needs to conduct a census of homeless in the state instead of any other census. I have been asking Mr Siddaramaiah for the last several months even before the caste census process was initiated to allow a census to be carried out by the Housing department to gather information about homeless. Whenever, I brought up this topic, he snubbed me stating that his ambitious caste census would encompass all these issues, so I need not bother about it,” the Housing minister rued.
Responding to query, Mr Ambareesh asserted that the Housing department would like to go ahead with a census of the homeless if the ongoing caste census fails to gather complete information on the homeless.
Answering another question, he claimed that the performance appraisal of ministers had never been an issue in a party like Congress. “The Chief Minister gathers information on ministers on a day-to-day basis through the intelligence wing. Media scrutiny is always there. No one should attach so much importance to it.”
Mr Ambareesh also ruled out the possibility of taking over the party’s reins from incumbent KPCC president Dr G. Parameshwar. “I know my limitations. I am already 64-years-old and I have no ambition to be the PCC president or the CM,” he said. He spoke about the long absence of former Mandya MP, Ramya from the political scene.
“Media should try to find it for the sake of people of Mandya. I do not know where she is. Victory and loss must be taken in one’s stride. Even I lost elections, but I never disappeared from public life,” he caustically remarked. On the increasing scams in the Housing department, the minister asserted that he had never bothered about what his predecessors did but was content with what he could do for the poor.
