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The Kerala government should withdraw from the controversial airport project at Aranmula if it was serious and sincere about its recent budget proposals, Communist Party of India district unit secretary P Prasad has said. In a statement issued in Pathanamthitta on March 17, Prasad alleged that the budget proposals had got a lot of contradictions with various projects launched by the United Democratic Front (UDF) government and it amply exposed the government鈥檚 double standards.

The budget presented by Finance Minister KM Mani had proposed the setting up of 鈥榞reen villages鈥� to ensure food safety, water safety, energy safety, and environment conservation and had allocated a total of Rs 42 crore for the same 鈥� Rs 3 crore each for the 14 districts. How could the government justify the proposal when it had decided to take 10 per cent equity in a private airport project that required conversion of a large extent of paddy land, wetland, and natural streams at Aranmula, the CPI leader asked.

Prasad said it was an irony on the part of the government to announce the setting up of a 鈥榞reen village鈥� in each district on the one hand and destroy the biodiversity and ecological balance of a heritage village like Aranmula in the name of a private airport project.

The CPI leader said paragraphs 46 and 47 of the budget spoke loudly about the alarming drought situation in the State and stressed the need to initiate effective measures to address the problem that was likely to aggravate in the years ahead. It further announced the decision to launch soil and water conservation measures, quoting a NASA study report on the depletion of ground water table in the State.