Tamil Nadu CM Edappadi K Palaniswami releases 3-year report card with a slew of achievements

CHENNAI: Surviving a roller-coaster ride, Edappadi K Palaniswami-led AIADMK government is close to completing three years in office. Among its achievements is getting the Centre to set up the Cauvery water management authority. On the investment front, the EPS government clocked inv
estment commitments to the tune of 3 lakh crore in the second edition of the global investors' meet.
The government put out a list of achievements on Saturday, which states that the chief minister cleared 16,382 files on developmental works in the last three years. Kudimaramath, the traditional restoration of water bodies, tops the list. Insiders say decision making is faster in the EPS regime. The average time taken for clearing a file is one day. In contrast, Jayalalithaa used to sit on files for years. The CM's office has also become accessible to bureaucrats and even public. About 64 lakh petitions were resolved in 'Amma Thittam' camps and 4.8 lakh petitions through CM's special grievance redressal scheme.

Concerted efforts by the chief minister to get central sanctions and proper coordination among various departments in the state government helped it secure 11 new medical colleges for Tamil Nadu under the central government sponsored scheme in the last one year, said S Vijaykumar, one of the secretaries in the chief minister's office. Pudukottai and Karur medical colleges were also sanctioned after Palaniswami assumed office as CM. If farmer unrest was one of the major headaches of the government, Palaniswami has now proposed a Cauvery protected special agricultural zone to prevent hydrocarbon exploration in eight Cauvery basin districts.
An exclusive cell set up by Palaniswami for investment facilitation and single window clearance of projects after his three-nation trip - UK, USA and UAE - in September, periodically meets and clears investment proposals. Under Jayalalithaa's last regime, Tamil Nadu was not seen as an investor-friendly state, because she had withdrawn into a shell after she was convicted in the disproportionate assets case and decisions were not taken on proposals. The government, last year, topped in good governance index ranking done by the Centre. Access to quality power is another major attraction for major investors.
If Jayalalithaa was adopting a confrontationist stand towards the neighbours, Palaniswami seeks to maintain good relationship with his counterparts in neighbouring states. He held out an olive branch to Kerala by visiting Thiruvananthapuram and agreeing to set up inter-state committees to resolve water disputes. "We have received 5.7tmcft feet of Krishna water in Poondi canal so far this year, which will help Chennai tide over the crisis in summer," said a senior bureaucrat.