Believe it or not, YSR Congress party president and Andhra Pradesh chief minister Y S Jagan Mohan Reddy on Saturday asked the Prime Minister Narendra Modi to immediately release at least Rs 80,000 crore which is due to the state from the Centre for the last five years.
This is apart from liberal financial assistance from the Centre to various schemes of the state government, apart from what is due to the state under AP Reorganisation Act.
First, Jagan asked Modi to release Rs 40,000 crore from the Centre towards grant-in-aid. As per the budgetary estimates, the state is due to get Rs 61,071 crore from the Centre towards grant-in-aid for various schemes. But what the state got so far was only Rs 6,739 crore.
“We have to clear pending bills worth Rs 50,000 crore for various works done by the previous government. So, we request the Centre to release at least Rs 40,000 crore for the development of the state,” Jagan said.
Secondly, as per the estimates of Comptroller and Auditor General of India, the revenue deficit of the state at the time of bifurcation of combined AP was Rs 22,948.76 crore. So far, the Centre released only Rs 3,979 crore and is yet to release the remaining Rs 18,969 crore. The state convinced the PMO on the figures of revenue deficit and so, the Centre should release this amount at the earliest.
Thirdly, the state had submitted revised estimates for Rs 55,548 crore for the Polavaram project. While this has to be approved at the earliest, the Centre should reimburse Rs 5,103 crore spent by the state from its own funds on Polavaram project, apart from paying another Rs 16,000 crore to speed up the project works.
Fourthly, Jagan asked PM to release the balance amount of Rs 1050 crore towards special package for development of backward areas.
All these figures add up to more than Rs 80,000 crore. Besides, the state asked liberal financial assistance to Navaratnas and other projects due to be sanctioned under AP Reorganisation Act.
What do you say, Mr Prime Minister!