Rural infrastructure outlay up by a third

BUDGET & THE ECONOMY

Chunk of allocation for rural roads connectivity.

Bharat Nirman, the United Progressive Alliance government's four-year business plan for rural infrastructure, has been allocated Rs 24,603 crore by the finance minister, indicating that it is a priority.

The allocation is 31.6 per cent higher than the Rs 18,696 crore allocated last year, with a huge chunk of the increase focusing on rural roads' connectivity.

Bharat Nirman aims to achieve road connectivity in all villages with a population of less than 1,000 (more than 500 in tribal and hilly areas).

The finance minister, in his speech, said till December 2006, 12,918 km of rural roads had been completed. A separate window under the programme will augment funds for roads by Rs 4,000 crore a year.

The ambitious Bharat Nirman programme, in place from 2005-06, is running under six components under the ministries of rural development, power, water resources and telecommunications. The objective is to provide basic amenities to rural India by 2009.

One of the major targets is to achieve irrigation of 1 crore hectares by 2009. Chidambaram stated that in the coming year, an additional 24 lakh hectares, including 9 lakh hectares under the Accelerated Irrigation Benefits Programme, will be brought under irrigation. The target for 2006-07 was 6 lakh hectares.

Another objective of the programme is to provide water supply in all villages. Under the Accelerated Rural Water Supply Programme, drinking water had been provided to 55,512 habitations until December 2006 against a target of 73, 120 habitations, the minister said.

Bharat Nirman also targets housing for all by building 60 lakh houses by 2009. The target of 15 lakh houses is likely to be exceeded in the coming year. In fact, 7.83 lakh houses have been constructed while 9.14 lakh houses are under construction.

The minister said the target of rural electrification had not been pursued well and the government was falling short in performance. So far, only 19,758 villages have been covered under the Rajiv Gandhi Grameen Vidyuth-ikaran Yojana. This is against a target of 125 000 villages.

In rural telephony, 15,054 villages have been provided with a telephone against the target of 20,000 villages till December last year. Bharat Nirman is to provide telephone connections to 66,822 number of villages and replace the dysfunctional systems.