Telangana has become a role model for other states, says Governor Soundararajan

Naveen S Garewal 
Tribune News Service 
Hyderabad, March 15 

The Telangana Vidhan Sabha Budget Session that started with the Governor’s address on Monday will continue for 10 business days till March 26.

The state budget for 2021-22 will be presented in both Houses on March 18. This was decided by the Business Advisory Committee (BAC) of the House soon after Governor Tamilisai Soundararajan delivered her address at the joint session of the assembly and the council.

After the budget presentation on Thursday, there will be no sitting on Friday. The assembly will resume operations from March 20 for a general discussion on the state budget and the chief minister will reply to the discussion on March 22. There will be no session on March 21 (Sunday). It has been decided to hold the Question Hour commencing from the same day till March 26.

In her address, Governor Tamilisai Soundararajan said Telangana state said several innovative and first of its kind programmes and schemes had been introduced by Chief Minister K Chandrashekhar Rao (KCR) that were now being replicated in other parts of the country.

Telangana, she said had been placed in the third position in the country in the Sustainable Development Goals India Index declared by Niti Aayog. Highlighting that from 2014, when the state came into being till 2019, Telangana has had a 17.24 per cent annual growth rate.

From a GSDP of Rs 4,51,580 crores in 2014 the state in 2019-20 touched a 114.71 per cent increase with GSDP at Rs 9,69,604 crores.

Similarly, in 2013-14, the per capita income in Telangana was Rs 1,12,162, but by 2019-20, it had more than doubled at Rs 2,28,216.

Stating that the state government’s policy was to “increase wealth and distribute it among the poor”, Soundararajan said by allocating a large share of the increase in revenues for welfare programmes, the state transformed itself into one of the best welfare-oriented governments in the country.

The Aasara pensions given by the government to the poor provided the people with security to life. At the time of the state’s formation, beneficiaries were getting only Rs 200 per month as pension which has gone up ten-folds now at Rs 2016 per month, she said.

“To pull the agriculture sector out of crisis and instil confidence among farmers, the government for the past seven years has initiated several measures in a phased manner. To optimally utilise river water in tune with the needs of the state, the government redesigned projects and completed them on war footing.

“The Kaleswaram project, which created history as the biggest multi-purpose and multi-stages lift irrigation scheme in the world, is now providing water to lakhs of acres,” she said, adding that major projects like Palamuru-Ranga Reddy and Sitarama projects were being completed on a fast track.

“For the first time in the country, farmers are given Rs 10,000 per acre as financial assistance under Rythu Bandhu to ensure that farmers don’t worry about input expenditure. Families of farmers are given Rs 5 lakh under Rythu Bima policy when a farmer dies irrespective of the cause of death,” she said, adding that both these schemes had been applauded by the United Nations.

Overcoming a very complicated power crisis that persisted in Telangana, the Governor said the state scripted a new history as the only state providing 24-hour free power supply to the farm sector and uninterrupted power to all sectors.

“This is a first of its kind in the state. The installed power capacity at the time of state formation was only 7778 MWs while it is 16245 MWs now. Then the per capita power consumption was 1356 units which increased to 2071 units at present,” she said.

The Governor also spoke about the success of Mission Bhagiratha in ensuring supply of safe drinking water to all the households in the state, quality education to students from the poorer and weaker sections of society through residential educational institutions and improved public health, among various other initiatives launched by the government.