‘Chouhan Made 21,000 Announcements, Not Even 10% Implemented’

If the Madhya Pradesh  Congress’s data is to be believed, in 13 years of his tenure, Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan has made around 21,675 announcements. According to the data,  the Chief Minister makes at least four announcements per day on average, bringing the total to 1,400 in a year.

THis one reason why, during a ‘Karykarta Samvad Rally’ in Bhopal recently, Congress President Rahul Gandhi compared Chouhan with former Indian cricketer Sachin Tendulkar. He said that just as the former was a run-making machine, the latter has been an announcement-making machine, with the lowest implementation ratio.

“Just like Sachin Tendulkar, Shivraj Singh Chouhan is an announcement machine who has made more than 21,000 announcements worth Rs 40,000 crore, though the implementation is the least,” said Gandhi

Mounting an attack on Chouhan, who is ase senior BJP leader,  over the string of announcements, Leader of Opposition Ajay Singh said, “His announcements are just hollow. During Vikas Yatra, he made highest 13, 279 announcements of worth Rs 25.50 crore, though, only 386 have been implemented, or work has initiated.”

He added “interestingly, he made 1,155 announcements only in Ujjain worth Rs 6.50 crore, however, only two of them have been implemented.”

Despite criticism, the Madhya Pradesh government hasn’t released any official data on the announcements made by Chouhan to counter Congress’ claim, though the government has released data for his current tenure.  

Data for current tenure

If the data released by the MP government is to be believed, 82%  of his announcements made in the past four and a half years have been fulfilled. During his current term, beginning from December 2013, Chouhan has made about 5,464 announcements. Of them, 4,343 announcements are reportedly fulfilled. Another 2,400 promises are yet to be completed, but the work is in progress, and the work for 1,121 is yet to be begin.

Interestingly, an announcement for which the work has just started is also counted as ‘completed’ by the government.   

As per the department-wise classification of the CM’s announcements, water resources (97), school education (77) and panchayat and gramin vikas (57) are the top three departments with maximum pendency rate. 

As per the government’s record on announcements, the CM made a maximum of 706 announcements in urban development and housing department, followed by public work department with 555, and panchayat and gramin vikas with 495 announcements. The CM has mostly made these announcements during public rallies or during constituency visits. Officials claimed that he makes only announcements that can be completed, and discusses its prospects with the department heads.  

At present, Chouhan is carrying out ‘Jan Ashirwad Yatra’ ahead of the Assembly elections, due this November. He will be addressing around 700 rallies, and in 250 rallies conducted until now, he has made four to five announcements on average in every rally, prompting the Congress to name him a 'Ghoshanaveer CM’, claiming that the data revealed by the secretariat was ‘fake and misleading’. 

Congress spokesperson JP Dhanopia said even 10% of the promises made by the CM have not been fulfilled.

Meanwhile, Public Relations Minister Narottam Mishra said “Congress president has no idea about what has changed in Madhya Pradesh. He should do his research first,” adding that “we want a certificate from the  public, and not from Congress.”