Friday, January 18, 2008

Government clears gamut of social sector packages seeing polls

Keeping in mind the up coming polls the government is trying to make a strong ground for itself. Working on this line the government on Thursday cleared a range of social sector packages. For the distressed farmers of the 31 debt-ridden districts of suicide-prone Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka and Kerala CCEA announced a fresh package of Rs 530 crore. The package is intended at helping farmers whose loans were overdue in July 2006.

The questions are being raised within the government on the way the package is being handled as many believe that it is the loans from moneylenders which are the prime driving force. In addition to this the experts believe that it takes three years for the banks to waive the interest and the principal in case of drought affected areas which puts pressure on farmers.

The CCEA also approved embellishing the coverage of the Kasturba Gandhi Balika Vidyalaya scheme. The rural blocks having below 30% female literacy will qualify to be treated as educationally backward, while 94 out of the 338 towns and cities having minority population and literacy rate under the 54% national average would have access to additional residential schools for girls. While the loan package was a result of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's package for the suicide prone areas, the scheme for the physically challenged was announced by finance minister P Chidambaram in the last budget.

But UPA which had planned to announce the packeages ahead of the Gujarat elections may find itself in a slightly tough position in the weeks ahead. “The government was hoping to announce elections after the Gujarat elections which have now disappeared after the setback engineered by Narendra Modi. The finance minister may just fall short of schemes to announce in the budget,” said an official.

Therefore, finance ministry officials said, government may end up allocating more funds for already-operational flagship schemes and projects like the agriculture mission. “Some schemes may see allocation double. Besides, the government does not have to worry about how much the ministries can spend,” an official said.

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