Naidu to now focus on building capital city, getting investments

Says his govt would announce sector-wise policies and incentives for attracting investments into the state within a month

Andhra Pradesh chief minister N Chandrababu Naidu today said his government would announce sector-wise policies and incentives for attracting investments into the state within a month.

"We will do it without waiting any further for the package of incentives promised by the Government of India as the delay would result in missed opportunities for the state," he said while interacting with the media as his government is set to complete six months in office this week.

Naidu, however, said he would continue to pursue with the Centre to get the special package and other incentives promised in the AP Bifurcation Act at the earliest.

The state government had recently announced the automobile sector policy with huge tax incentives applicable to integrated automobile manufacturing projects having a total investment commitment of over Rs 2,000 crore. "If I am not big on the incentives how would the investments come to the state?" he questioned when asked if the incentives such as VAT reimbursement equivalent to one-and-a-half times of the capital expenditure to the automobile sector was on the higher side.

On why the Centre was taking so long to announce the incentives to AP despite the TDP being a partner in the NDA government, Naidu said he could not blame the Government of India as the low growth in the country's economy had put everybody in problems. "In my case, the problems are manifold," he said.

With major electoral promises such as implementation of enhanced old-age pension at Rs 1,000 a month and the first phase loan waiver more or less in place, the government would now start dealing with the issues of capital city development and other developmental needs in infrastructure.

Naidu said a host of facilities, including government buildings, residential, and socio, commercial infrastructure, would be developed in the identified capital city region in the first phase, which, according to him, would be completed before the 2019 elections. Meantime, the government would also start building some facilities to shift a part of the government activities to Vijayawada, he said.

For improving the air-connectivity to the capital city region, the government has already asked the civil aviation authorities to complete the construction of the new terminal building at the existing Vijayawada airport in the next six months besides readying the new runway in 6-8 months' time, he said. "But later we would go for greenfield international airports both in Vijayawada and Visakhapatnam and will strengthen the existing airport at Tirupati," he said.

The government is also working with various service providers to provide every household in AP with 15 MBPS bandwidth internet connectivity costing as low as Rs 130 per month in two years .

Resources
The chief minister said his government would use multiple channels to raise resources to fund the capital city and other infrastructure. He said even red sanders would be used for this purpose by regrowing the plant species in the vast forest lands on a continuous basis.

About the change in his policies on subsidies, Naidu said he had not quit the path of economic reforms but was only trying to see that the benefits of the economic development reaches all the sections of society. "I had linked all the welfare programmes to Aadhaar. This way, I had saved Rs 700 crore of public money just in the public distribution system. I contained the activities of red sanders mafia, which had left just the C-grade wood by the time we came to power. All these are part of my economic reform agenda," he said.

His government has targeted to almost triple the gross state domestic product to Rs 12.75 lakh crore from the present Rs 4.75 lakh crore by 2019.