Andhra Pradesh Government has cut capital expenditure and stopped certain development works due to financial problems Chief Minister N. Chandrababu Naidu said here on Tuesday.
Addressing a press conference here, the Chief Minister said that he had taken up the matter with Union Finance Minister Arun Jaitley at Davos recently and discussed about various assurances given by the Centre at the time of bifurcation of the united State, including incentives to industries and bridging the deficit budget of about Rs.16,000 crore. Mr. Jaitley has promised a decision as early as possible, he added.
He said that even before bifurcation it was known that the residuary Andhra Pradesh State would have a deficit budget while Telangana would end up with surplus budget. The Government of India had committed that it would compensate A.P. for the loss, he observed.
Asked about the lukewarm response from the Centre, Mr. Naidu said that the Centre was expecting that its financial position would improve after a couple of years. The Chief Minister, however, insisted on the Centre coming to AP’s rescue now and pointed out that it would get some relief on the economic front due to fall in crude oil prices internationally.
He parried a question on how the State intended to mobilise resources if the expected help from the Centre did not materialise saying that “I am more anxious than you. I am doing my best”, he said.
Giving an overview of the interactions he had with CEOs and industrialists from various global companies, Mr. Naidu said that the general feedback from them was that India was far behind with regard to “ease of doing business”. He said that rules and regulations would have to be simplified for foreign investors to come to India.
The Chief Minister said that his government would soon announce its own package of incentives for industries and was also negotiating with the Centre to tweak policies.
Mr. Naidu said that Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates has promised to “work out” to his request “to come to Vizag”.
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