The State government has affirmed that it was opting for borrowings from commercial banks to ensure speedy completion of irrigation projects as they held out huge promise for farmers.
Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao has said once completed, the irrigation projects promise business turnover of the agricultural products to the tune of ₹ 1.25 lakh crore. The State had made sure that it remains within the norms specified under the FRBM Act and took steps to ensure that these loans were used for productive purposes.
He was responding to Opposition leader Mallu Bhattivikramarka's charge that the government was resorting to indiscriminate borrowings from commercial banks and that stage is being set for levy of charges on people for supply of drinking water.
The Chief Minister said the government would indicate revenue streams in the detailed project reports submitted to the banks for obtaining loans and one such stream was allocation of 10% of the treated water to the industry which readily accepted the costs.
Grants to GPs
He said while the municipalities and municipal corporations should foot the bills for the water supplied to them, the government would provide grants to Gram Panchayats to off set the burden on them.
“Banks coming forward to provide loans itself is credit to the State and its robust finances and the State Cabinet can take decision on providing grants to rural local bodies and GPs,” he averred.
Minor irrigation
While the irrigation projects were being speeded up, the government had focussed on rejuvenating the minor irrigation sector, which was thoroughly neglected by the successive governments of the erstwhile united A.P., by taking up check dams and other structures with an estimated ₹4,000 crore, he said.
The Chief Minister, who replied to a marathon debate during the passage of the Appropriation Bill in the Legislative Assembly on Monday, launched scathing attack on the Congress during whose regime the projects were confined to paper.
“We have scrapped the mobilisation advances and EPC system besides ensuring that the funds allocated are utilised effectively,” he said.
The government had accordingly prioritised the Medigadda barrage with huge storage capacity while the Kaleshwaram project had been designed in such a way that it could draw 3 tmc ft water every day.
Projects conceived during the previous Congress regime were found to be unviable and some of them like the Pranahita Chevella Sujala Sravanti were designed as an eye wash to divert attention of the people from the largesse being doled out to neighbouring Andhra Pradesh, the Chief Minister said.