Andhra Pradesh had been sanctioned more than ₹10,000 crore under various schemes for urban development, Union Minister of Housing and Urban Affairs Hardeep Singh Puri said on Saturday.
The Union Minister was addressing the media at the BJP office here virtually from New Delhi ahead of the municipal elections in the State.
Smart Cities
More than ₹1,000 crore had been sanctioned under the Atal Mission for Rejuvenation and Urban Transformation (AMRUT), ₹1,664 crore for development Kakinada, Visakhapatnam, Tirupati and Amaravati as Smart Cities, and ₹9,311 crore for housing under the Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana (PMAY), the Union Minister said. All these amounts had been sanctioned in the last six years, he added.
Under Swachh Bharat alone, ₹571 crore had been sanctioned, and ₹567 crore of it had been released, he said.
“Due to the intervention of the Union government, 110 urban local bodies in the State have been declared 100% open defecation-free,” Mr. Puri said.
PMAY
Expressing unhappiness over the YSRCP government trying to claim credit for the projects funded by the Central government, Mr. Puri said, “We have sanctioned 20 lakh houses under the PMAY, which is about 20% of the total houses sanctioned across the country. The Union government is also providing a subsidy of ₹1.5 lakh per house. It is painful to learn that the State government is taking the entire credit and misguiding the people,” Mr. Puri said.
BJP Rajya Sabha member G.V.L. Narasimha Rao, who moderated the virtual media conference, alleged that that funds provided by the Union government were not being utilised properly, and the results were not on expected lines as a consequence.
Third party evaluation sought
He urged the Union Minister to get the works being done by the State and the civic bodies evaluated by a third party.
The Union Minister further said that Andhra Pradesh was yet to submit utilisation certificate for certain works undertaken. About ₹2,631 crore was not yet utilised under the PMAY, he added.
“From 2004 to 2014, the Congress government had spent ₹1.57 lakh crore for urban intervention programmes. From 2014 to 2020, the BJP-led Central government had spent about ₹11 lakh crore. This clearly indicates the focus and intention of the government,” Mr. Puri observed.
Earlier, BJP State president Somu Veerraju said that the State government had allotted 30 lakh house pattas, which included 15 lakh in the urban areas. The subsidy being provided by the Centre was to the tune of ₹24,000 crore, he said, and added that this aspect was not being highlighted by the State government. “The projects are being branded under a different name,” he lamented.
