On Gandhi Jayanti day, it will rain welfare schemes in Andhra Pradesh

Hyderabad: Come October 2 and the Andhra Pradesh Government will launch a host of schemes keeping with the promises made by the Telugu Desam Party ahead of the general elections in May.

'NTR Sujala', a scheme intended to supply purified drinking water at Rs 2 per 20 litres, will be launched at Hindupur, Anantapuram district. "The scheme will be implemented in 1,230 villages spread across all the 175 Assembly constituencies in the state," Minister for Information and Public Relations Palle Raghunatha Reddy said.

The state Cabinet, at a meeting on Monday, cleared the scheme. In fact, it was one of the five schemes which Chandrababu Naidu cleared immediately after taking oath as Chief Minister on June 8.

Similarly, the hike in monthly pension amount for various categories would be implemented from October 2. Senior citizens, widows, weavers and toddy tappers would henceforth be given a monthly pension of Rs 1,000 as against the current

amount of Rs 200.

Physically-challenged persons with disability of 40-79 per cent would get a monthly pension of Rs 1,000, up from Rs 500, while those with disability of over 80 per cent would get Rs 1,500, the Minister said.

"In all there are 43,12,533 persons drawing various social security pensions in the state. The additional burden on the consequent to the hike will be Rs 3,600 crore a year.

The Centre grants Rs 300 to only nine lakh pensioners while the balance amount is borne by the state Government." The state would go in for 100 per cent Aadhaar and biometric linkage for the pension schemes, he said.

A special drive would be conducted across AP from September 19-21 to identify eligible beneficiaries for sanction of new pensions as well as weed out ineligible ones. The Minister said that the NTR Aarogya Seva (health service) would also be launched on Gandhi Jayanti day to extend cashless treatment of up to Rs 2.5 lakh per family.

This would be a "improvised" version of the 'Aarogyasri' health insurance scheme launched by the YS Rajasekhara Reddy-led Congress government in 2006.

While 938 diseases were covered under Aarogyasri, 100 more would be added under NTR Aarogya Seva, Reddy added.

The scheme would cover state government employees as well as journalists uniformly. No premium amount needs to be paid by the beneficiaries under the scheme, he said.