AP to unveil new policy co-opting farmers as partners

Chennai, Aug 3 (UNI) The Andhra Pradesh Government will unveil a new policy co-opting farmers as partners while acquiring lands from them for infrastructural projects, Chief Minister Y S Rajasekhara Reddy announced today.

Delivering the key-note address at ''Suminfra-2006--A Summit on Sustainable PPPs in Infrastructure'', organised by the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) here, he said the new policy would be announced in the next ten days.

He said land acquisition was a major bottleneck in any infrastructural project, requiring thousands of acres.

Citing the Rs 4,000 crore 160 km eight lane Hyderabad Outer Ring Project taken up for the first time in the country, he said land prices had sky-rocketted the moment the project was announced, causing much heartburn among farmers.

The Government would tackle this problem by making the farmers the stakeholders and giving back 10 per cent of the acquired lands as developed to them.

''This will be a policy with a human face'', he said and urged the other states to adopt similar policies.

He said the Hyderabad Rapid Urban Transit System was fast becoming a reality and the international competitive bidding process will be completed smoothly. The construction work will start in the next two months.

Mr Reddy said the first ever green field airport would be completed by March 2008 and two more minor ports will be taken up for development at Nizampatnam and Machilipatnam.

On the development of irrigation infrastructure, he said during the last two years Rs 9900 crore was spent on irrigation alone, creating irrigation potential of 5,15,000 acres.

''This year (2006-07), we will be spending about Rs 10,0420 crore creating additional irrigation potential of 7,50,000 acrre'', he said and added that this would enhance irrigation facilities and ensure that unrest in rural areas would become a thing of the past.

MORE UNI GV SI KP1536