Andhra Pradesh gets Rs 3,796 cr interest-free loan from Centre

The Central government sanctioned Rs 3,796 crore interest-free loan to Andhra Pradesh, Union Minister tells Parliament

Visakhapatnam: The Centre has sanctioned a Rs.3,796 crore interest-free loan to Andhra Pradesh.

Union Minister of State for Finance Pankaj Chaudhary informed this in reply to a question by BJP member GVL Narasimha Rao in the Rajya Sabha on Tuesday. Andhra Pradesh was sanctioned Rs. 3,796 crore for the year 2022-23 out of the total amount of Rs.85,877 crore to 28 states in the country as part of the Scheme for Special Assistance to States for Capital Investment. This was against the budget announcement by union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman who offered to provide Rs.1 lakh crore as long term, 50 year interest free loans to the state governments, the minister disclosed.

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Loan amount for different states was allocated to different states in proportion to their share of Tax Devolution for 2022-23 and the fund has to be only utilised for the purpose for which it is sanctioned, he noted.

The bulk of the amount sanctioned for Andhra Pradesh was for capital investments in the education and health sectors. A sum of Rs.1,738 crore has been sanctioned for the implementation of the school infrastructure improvement project “Mana Badi Nadu Nedu” phase-2 in all the 26 districts of Andhra Pradesh. Another Rs.1500 crore was sanctioned for the construction of buildings and purchase of equipment in government medical colleges and construction of a second PHC building in most of the districts. The remaining amount of Rs.554 crore was approved for industrial water supply and infrastructure projects in the YSR district and optical Fibre cable project across all districts of Andhra Pradesh.

Commenting on the substantial financial assistance to the state government, GVL Narasimha Rao said that the expenditure on social infrastructure in the state on Government schools under ‘Nadu Nedu’, primary health centres, medical colleges is mainly due to generous financial assistance by the Narendra Modi-led Central government. Thanking Prime Minister for the massive assistance to Andhra Pradesh for capital investments in health and education sectors, he pointed out that all visible development in Andhra Pradesh was largely due to Central assistance to the state under various schemes and projects as the state government is bankrupt and had faltered even on salary payments to its employees.