Chief Minister N. Chandrababu Naidu on Friday announced enhancement of rice quota for beneficiaries under the public distribution system (PDS) at the rate of five kilograms per head starting from April first week. In the existing system, each family receives 20 kg while the revised quota will determine the quantity based on the number of members in a family. The Chief Minister also launched the Social Empowerment Mission, one of the seven missions and five grids of the government.
Addressing a meeting here, Mr. Naidu said the Social Empowerment Mission was the second in the serious of seven missions aimed at focused approach for development.
A consortium of nine government departments would work together to improve the social indicators of people in the areas of health, education and finance. The mission would work under Health Secretary L.V. Subramanyam.
Mr. Naidu said Kurnool district was identified for launching the scheme deliberately to address the core issues of the district which was lagging in social indicators. Had the funds granted by successive governments since independence reached the target groups, the situation could have been different but most of it was misused and went into the pockets of middlemen and corrupt politicians, he remarked.
Mr. Naidu said the condition of Andhra Pradesh was akin to that of Kurnool post-bifurcation which landed at the bottom of the list along with Jammu and Kashmir. Mr. Naidu said the Centre had to come to the rescue of the State if it had to surmount all economic hurdles in the next five years and remarked that the 14th Finance
Commission award was also disappointing. It was the duty of the State government to keep appraising the situation without great patience.
The Chief Minister said he was according great priority to irrigation development stating that much before Polavaram was completed around 70 tmc would be shifted from Godavari Basin to Krishna which in turn would be allocated to Srisailam projects such as Hundri-Neeva and Galeru Nagari. The project costing Rs. 1,300 crore was cleared recently.
Deputy Chief Minister K.E. Krishna Murthy, Ministers Kamineni Srinivas, Ravela Kishore Babu and others were present.
