Pradhan Mantri Adarsh Gram Yojana on a pilot basis in 1,000 villages
With a view to emphasise its focus on the common man, especially the rural poor, the government today raised Budget allocation for the rural roads and electrification components of the Bharat Nirman programme by 54 and 27.71 per cent, respectively, in the Union Budget for 2009-10.
The allocation for the Pradhan Mantri Gram Sadak Yojana has been raised to Rs 12,000 crore from the revised estimate of Rs 7,780 crore in the previous year. Allocation for the Rajiv Gandhi Grameen Vidyutikaran Yojana has been stepped up to Rs 6,300 crore, vis-à-vis last year’s revised estimate of Rs 4,933 crore. Allocation for the housing component of Bharat Nirmaan, Indira Awaas Yojana, stayed unchanged at Rs 8,800 crore.
To broaden the pace of rural housing, the Budget has allocated, from the shortfall in the priority sector lending of commercial banks, Rs 2,000 crore towards the Rural Housing Fund in the National Housing Bank (NHB). This will boost the resources of NHB for its operations in the rural housing sector.
The Budget has also proposed to launch a new scheme called the Pradhan Mantri Adarsh Gram Yojana on a pilot basis in 1,000 villages where the population of Scheduled Castes is above 50 per cent. Allocation of Rs 100 crore has been made for the integrated development of the identified villages.
Each village would be able to avail “gap funding” of Rs 10,00,000 over and above the allocations under the Rural Development and Poverty Alleviation schemes. On successful implementation of the pilot phase, the programme would be extended to other such villages. Overall, there are about 44,000 villages in which the population of Scheduled Castes is above 50 per cent.
