The last day of Chief Minister N. Kiran Kumar Reddy’s tour of Ranga Reddy district on Wednesday saw the Chevella Assembly constituency getting a whopping Rs. 390 crore worth works sanctioned.
Upgradation of the Kandi-Shankerpally road with World Bank assistance of Rs. 270 crore, new bus depot at Chevella, increase of bed strength of the government hospital here from 50 to 100 and sanction of a 30 bedded hospital and a junior college at Shankarpally are among the various projects announced.
Later, addressing a well attended public meeting at Chevella, the Chief Minister said the government had a strong sentiment towards this constituency represented by Home Minister, P. Sabita Indra Reddy, and earlier by her husband. Acknowledging the lusty cheers from the crowd, Mr. Reddy said it was not an election meeting at all.
It was the Congress government’s way of finding out whether the benefits of the welfare schemes grounded for the poor and weaker sections were reaching them or not.
Reiterating his government’s commitment to empower women, Mr. Reddy declared that 50 per cent of seats would be reserved for women in the next round of elections to the local bodies – panchayats, MPTCs and Zilla Parishads.
There were 2.8 crore families in the State and each one was availing at least two to three welfare schemes for which the government was spending Rs. 8.5 crore.
For the self help groups alone the government was paying interest on their behalf running into Rs. 1,300 to Rs. 1,400 crore annually on the Rs. 13,000 crore bank loan sanctioned.
“There was a time when women were dependent on their husbands and children for money but now it is the other way round”, the Chief Minister remarked drawing a round of applause.
The government will waive the interest of farmers who obtain loans below Rs. 1 lakh, the Chief Minister said.
SC-ST sub-plan
Referring to the recent adoption of Bill for SC, ST sub-plans, he faulted the opposition for trying to create trouble at this historic occasion. The Congress government, he assured, was not against categorisation of SCs. The injustice done to these disadvantaged groups over the years would be set right in the next 10 years. From the next budget, funds would be earmarked for the development of SCs and STs.
The Chief Minister announced that ST tandas with more than 1000 population would be declared gram panchayats. He said the government was taking steps to protect the interest of dairy farmers and instructions were given not to reduce milk procurement price. Government had launched a Rs. 5500 crore milk mission to help dairy farmers. Ms. Sabita Indra Reddy, thanked the Chief Minister for sanctioning a number of projects for her constituency.
The Chief Minister also laid the foundation stone for BT road from Chevella main road to Kismathpur via Bandlaguda, for construction of ROB at Nagulpally and inaugurated 33 KV sub station of Narkhoda village and Central Drug Store at Shivarampally. He later interacted with farmers at Tirumalapur in Pudur over the Indra Jala Prabha scheme. Mr. Reddy was surprised when a SHG group woman, Shoba Rani, said her group established in 1996 had got bank of loan of Rs. 17 lakh. Asked why the amount was so less, the woman replied that some of the group members did not repay the loan regularly. “Do you know that now no interest is collected from the SHGs,” the Chief Minister asked the bewildered woman.
After completing a three-day whirlwind tour of Ranga Reddy district on Wednesday, the Chief Minister said several infrastructural projects had been inaugurated. The projects were worth over Rs.2,400 crore.
Of this, about Rs.1200 crore was for Outer Ring Road (ORR). The government was committed to the development of Ranga Reddy district and several projects, including market committee godowns, roads, improving infrastructure in hospitals were launched, Mr. Reddy said. To a query over the delay in completion of Pranahita-Chevalla project, he said it was a mammoth project worth over Rs. 33,000 crore. Yet, measures are being taken to complete the project at the earliest, he replied.
