State Rural Development Minister Dokka Manikya Varaprasad Rao on Monday mooted the Tadikonda model for maintenance of social welfare hostels.
Chairing the Prakasam District Development Review Committee meeting (DDRC), Mr Rao, flanked by Union Minister of State for Handlooms and Textiles Panabaka Lakshmi and Municipal Administration Minister M Mahidhar Reddy, said social welfare hostels maintenance had been a smooth affair in his home constituency of Tadikonda thanks to constitution of trusts in every mandal.
“Each of the trusts chaired by the Mandal Development Officer concerned takes care of all the needs of dalit students and maintenance of social welfare hostels in my constituency,'' he said and wanted the same to be replicated in other places.
Expressing concern over dalits pulling out their wards from social welfare hostels for a variety of reasons, including ill-health and poor upkeep, he said “we have to take urgent steps to stop this''.
Members cutting across party lines complained of poor maintenance of social welfare hostels, including non-clearance of rent for over a year in some social welfare hostels started in private buildings.
The Minister suggested revival of the ‘Sankeyama bata' by MPs, MLAs and officials to oversee functioning of social welfare hostels and improve their condition.
He asked the officials concerned to put up a file for enhancing rent wherever private buildings were engaged based on present rental position. He wanted the district administration to arrange for constituency-level review meetings to address in detail various issues concerning each of the 12 Assembly constituencies in the district.
Chirala MLA A Krishnamohan complained of more number of teachers than students in some schools and called for review of their functioning. In the schools he had inspected it was found that the student strength had been inflated to 60 and the attendance was hardly half of it.
MLC from Graduates constituency Vitapu Balasubrahmanyam expressed concern over 58 per cent dropout among students at the eighth standard level in the district. He urged the district administration to improve the staff strength in schools by appointing more Vidya volunteers.
The meeting was attended by among others Ongole MP M Srinivasulu Reddy, Congress MLAs Dagubatti Venkateswara Rao, B N Vijaykumar, B Sivaprasada Reddy, M Ugra Narasimha Reddy, Anna Ram Babu, G.V. Seshu, TDP MLA K Narayana Reddy, TDP MLC Sidda Raghava Rao and MLC from Teachers constituency Y Srinivasulu Reddy.
