RBI nod to reschedule farm loans in AP

HYDERABAD: In a much awaited relief to the farmers of Andhra Pradesh, the RBI Governor had in principle agreed to reschedule the Kharif loans. The AP government is expecting official letter on the loan rescheduling assurance from RBI in the next two days.

Announcing the decision at a press conference at the Secretariat here, finance minister Yanamala Ramakrishnudu, agriculture minister P Pulla Rao and communication advisor Parakala Prabhakar said RBI Governor Raghuram Rajan had communicated the decision to chief minister N Chandrababu Naidu. Ramakrishnudu said a clear picture on the crop loan rescheduling would emerge only after the government receives the RBI letter.

'We can comment on the crop loan rescheduling only after we see the RBI letter; how much we have got; what we can offer to farmers; and other things,' he remarked.

'We want to make it clear that whatever be the conditions for loan rescheduling we would see that the burden will not fall on the farmers. All the farmers would get the benefit of loan rescheduling,' he said. He said the RBI will be writing on loan rescheduling to the Centre and clarity will emerge only after that.

Commenting on the 30 days performance of his government, the finance minister said it was taking measures to attract investment to the state. Royal Dutch Shell and Reliance Power are planning to set up a floating liquefied natural gas (LNG) import terminal off the coast of Kakinada.

Similarly, Petronet is also planning to set up an LNG terminal at Gangavaram port near Visakhapatnam, he said. These two projects would help develop the Kakinada- Visakhapatnam industrial corridor, he added. He said the state government was looking into the issue of fee reimbursement of students. 'We would see that all the students get justice,' he remarked.

Justifying the Centre's decision to handover law and order to the Governor, Ramakrishnudu said this was being done as per the AP State Reorganisation Act and the Telangana state government should honour it.

'The Governor had been given the charge of taking care of the people living in Hyderabad and rest of the powers are still with the government of Telangana,' he pointed out. Due to the efforts of the AP government, the Centre has issued the ordinance allowing the merger of 7 mandals of Khammam district to execute the Polavaram project.

24-Hour power October 2, says Yanamala

Andhra Pradesh government would provide 24 hours power to domestic and industrial consumers from October 2. Finance minister Ramakrishnudu said AP has been chosen, along with Rajasthan and Delhi states, for the NDA government's ambitious programme to provide 24-hour power supply and through this, the state would get uninterrupted power supply.

He said the farmers would also be initially provided seven hours of uninterrupted power supply, which would be enhanced to nine hours in the coming days.

'The government was trying to purchase power from Tamil Nadu and other sources to meet the requirements of the state,' he said. The finance minister said all the damaged pump sets of the farmers would be replace free of cost under the Central scheme. He said that the state had been assured of supply of 4 lakh mt of coal by the Centre and with this the power requirement of the state would fulfilled.