Austerity up in smoke

When Chief Minister Ajit Jogi got onto a balloon last evening to mark the beginning of Chhattisgarh’s second birthday celebrations, man...

When Chief Minister Ajit Jogi got onto a balloon last evening to mark the beginning of Chhattisgarh’s second birthday celebrations, many people must have been wondering what the hot air he was floating on comprised. How about his promise, after party chief Sonia Gandhi’s rebuke, that the festivities would be austere.

That promise went up in smoke, literally, as his government raised the curtains on the rajyotsav at Raipur’s Science College ground. If Jogi’s life-size cutouts adorned the ground, the atmosphere was created by a live show by Pandvani dancer and a Padma Shree Teejan Bai.

Besides, there were raut and sua dancers and police band, which held stalls showcasing the government’s ‘‘achievements’’. The expenditure over the week-long festivities is likely to cross Rs 4 crore.

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But if the CM had his way, that figure would have been closer to Rs 10 crore. He had invited both Sonia and President A.P.J. Abdul Kalam for the festivities. As it so happened, both refused, with Sonia advising Jogi to keep it low after last year’s 15-day-long celebrations, which had left the state poorer by at least Rs 7-8 crore. Even his Madhya Pradesh counterpart Digvijay Singh backed out. However, Governor Dinesh Nandan Sahay did turn up and was escorted around the stalls by Jogi.

Sonia’s refusal had forced Jogi to cancel an event to mark laying of the foundation stone for a Rs 4,500-crore new capital project and a media blitz.

Left out of the exercise, the Opposition is carping at Jogi’s jambooree. BJP leader Nand Kumar Sai points out that no opposition MLA was invited for the function. ‘‘The state will be poorer by over Rs 5 crore after the celebrations,’’ he says.

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