With an objective to boost road connectivity to rural areas in the country the Union government on February 7 cleared road projects worth about Rs 38,500 crore under the rural road connectivity scheme, the Pradhan Mantri Gram Sadak Yojana (PMGSY) which was launched in 2000.
The Prime Minister Manmohan Singh presided over a meeting of the Union Cabinet, which gave in-principle approval to the projects for building roads in rural habitations, including villages located in areas affected by Left-wing extremism and those near the countryÂ’s borders with China, Myanmar, Bangladesh, Bhutan and Pakistan.
The PMGSY was launched in 2000, when the BJP-led NDA was in power at the Centre. The ambitious scheme envisaged laying all-weather roads to link all villages with at least 500 residents in the plain areas and 250 or more inhabitants in the hilly, desert and tribal areas.
The projects, which were approved by the Union Cabinet included 1,491 habitations, each having a population of more than 500 people, in Karnataka. However, Rural Development Minister Jairam Ramesh rejected the BJPÂ’s demand to rename the project after Atal Behari Vajpayee, the prime minister in the erstwhile NDA government.
Ramesh said though the scheme was launched during VajpayeeÂ’s tenure, the NDA government had made a minuscule allocation between Rs 3,000 and Rs 4,000 crore for the projects. He added that about Rs 24,000 crore was allocated for the PMGSY in the last Budget.
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