Uttar Pradesh demands major concessions from Centre to boost growth

New Delhi, Dec 9 (UNI) Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Mulayam Singh Yadav today demanded "generous" Central assistance, especially in the creation of infrastructure, agriculture and education, to close the gap between the state's rate of growth and the national growth rate.

Speaking at the National Development Council meeting here, Mr Yadav said unless the most populous states like UP and Bihar developed at a faster rate, there would be an adverse effect on the national growth.

For this, he said, the states will have to mobilise resources on a large scale, but the Central Government will need to provide additional resources to states without any discrimination.

The Chief Minister said the state had made all necessary arrangements for the creation of additional generation capacity of 13,830 MW during the 11th Five Year Plan, but he criticised the Coal Ministry, saying its attitude was not positive in allotment of fuel for new power plants.

He urged the Centre to ensure timely fuel supply to the new projects the state had taken up.

Mr Yadav said the agricultural growth rate needs to be kept at 5.7 per cent, while the growth rate for manufacturing sector needed to be 11.5 per cent and for services sector 12.4 per cent. All these targets, he said, require an investment of about Rs 8 lakh crore, for which positive support from the Centre was needed.

The Chief Minister proposed giving credit to farmers at four per cent interest rate, arguing that if tax rebate of Rs one lakh crore could be provided for establishing Special Economic Zones, concession could be given for a sector like agriculture which was the mainstay of the country's economy.

He sought reduction in the price of diesel and providing greater small and marginal farmers greater access to irrigation facilities for boosting the agricultural sector.

Mr Yadav also sought timely and adequate availability of fertilisers for achieving desirable level of production and productivity. For this he demanded concession in railway freight in the months of August to October and Central subsidy for warehousing.

He said the state goverment has a target of electrifying all the village by March next year, and providing electricity connection to every household in the first three years of the 11th Plan, but for that an assistance of Rs 6150 crore was required from the Central Government.

More UNI NAZ YA BD1459