Chief Minister Siddaramaiah hands over an acknowledgement of 'Yuva Nidhi' scheme to an unemployed girl at the launch of Congress' 5th guarantee at Vidhana Soudha in Bengaluru on Tuesday. Minister Priyank Kharge, Deputy CM D K Shivakumar, Ministers Dr Sharan Prakash Patil and Dr M C Sudhakar are seen.
Credit: DH Photo/B K Janardhan
Chief Minister Siddaramaiah, while launching the registration of candidates for the government’s fifth guarantee Yuva Nidhi scheme, criticised Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Tuesday and said, “The Congress government has successfully launched all its five guarantees. But the state is not bankrupt as the prime minister stated earlier.”
“We have proved you wrong,” Siddaramaiah said mentioning the prime minister’s name. Under Yuva Nidhi, unemployed graduates and diploma pass-outs would get financial assistance for two years from the government.
“Modi is not an economist. Earlier, during one of his public speeches, the prime minister had stated that the state would go bankrupt if the guarantees were implemented. Now, we have implemented all five guarantees and the state is financially stable,” Siddaramaiah claimed.
‘Most lying PM’
Elaborating on the successful implementation of all five guarantees, he attacked the prime minister by calling him the “most lying prime minister in the history of the country’.
“Mr Prime Minister, you had promised to provide two crore jobs in a year. If that were true, 20 crore jobs would have been generated by now. Where are those jobs? You have failed to keep up your promise and accept that,” he said.
Siddaramaiah warned the prime minister that the youth from the state would question him for not keeping up the promise regarding the generation of jobs.“We have implemented all guarantees along with maintaining the financial stability of the state. Our youth will question you and you are answerable to them,” he said.
Siddaramaiah assured of filling all the vacancies at the various departments of the government in a phased manner.
The scheme
He said that along with financial assistance, the unemployed youth will get free skill training. The scheme runs under a self-declaration process by beneficiaries every month. If a beneficiary gets a job or joins higher education, then they must update the same and the assistance will be discontinued for them. The registration is free of cost.
Menaka, a graduate still looking for a job, submitted the first application under the scheme. As per the data from the Department of Skill Development, around 5.29 lakh degree and diploma pass-outs are in the state.
Deputy Chief Minister D K Shivakumar, Skill Development Minister Dr Sharan Prakash Patil and others were present in the programme.